


knew your love (before i kissed you)

by orphan_account



Category: Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (2020)
Genre: Birds of Prey - freeform, F/F, First Everything, First Kiss, First Time, Friends to Lovers, Idiots in Love, Love Confessions, Slow-ish burn, Softness, There will be sex, as many tropes as i can cram in, awkward helena, dinah can help, dinah is cocky, dinah is cool, dinah is not a virgin, dinah sees and understands helena for who she is, dinah thinks her weirdness is endearing, everyone knows except them and everyone is annoyed, heated eye contact is involved, helena has feelings and doesn't know what to do about them, helena has never had a friend and thinks being in love is friendship, helena is a feral jock lesbian and dinah is her small vicious gf, helena is both touch averse and touch starved, helena is oblivious and a mess, helena is painfully uncool, helena is such a fucking idiot, helena really has no idea how to talk to people and it shows, i am wildly self indulgent, i dont blame her, it is very soft and very gay, like holy shit, lots of kisses, one year after birds of prey, power bottom dinah, renee boos and hisses, renee is so tired of their shit, renee thinks they're both idiots, service top helena, someone gets stabbed and someone has to sew them up, there will be smut bc i am a slut, these dummies, they are so stupid and so gay, virgin helena
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-10
Updated: 2020-06-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:27:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 78,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22643359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Surviving the massacre of your entire family at the age of eight is a pretty impressive feat. Training for fifteen years in Sicily until you can kill a man with one hand and a hairpin is also a pretty impressive feat. Returning to the city where your family was cut down and killing every single person involved in their deaths is maybe the most impressive feat. Somehow, it's never been enough for Helena.
Relationships: Helena Bertinelli/Dinah Lance, Renee Montoya/Ellen Yee, The Huntress/Black Canary
Comments: 383
Kudos: 1344





	1. i: helena does some thinking. it's a bad idea.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Helena/Dinah fic with a character-study type thing of them both. I haven't been able to get them out of my head since I saw the movie and this is what my brain produced.

Helena Bertinelli, daughter of the late Franco and Maria Bertinelli and the last surviving member of the Bertinelli crime family, was slowly but surely running out of things to live for. Turns out dedicating your entire life to a single mission and then actually completing that mission before age twenty-five was not a great way to live. 

Helena sighed, flopping backwards onto her couch and staring up at the water damage that had been slowly spreading across her ceiling for the past month. A single drop of blood trickled from her left nostril, running down the side of her face until it landed in her ear, and if she cared a bit more, she probably would have wiped it away. 

“Stop mocking me.” Helena said, to no one, because she lived alone and had recently taken to talking to herself so the silence didn’t drive her insane. Her knuckles were scraped to hell and arrows stuck out of the far wall of her studio, but she wasn’t going to get the deposit back on her apartment anyways and her knuckles were never not busted up. “Ugh. Fuck.” 

What would her mamma and babbo think of her now? A fucking vigilante, living in a tiny apartment above a bodega, fighting crime as a goddamn superhero. (Not quite a superhero, but still.) This was not how her life was supposed to turn out. She should have been ready to take over from her father as the head of the Bertinelli family by now, maybe with her little brother involved, a millionaire in the massive mansion she had grown up in with nothing in her future but power and fortune and underworld business dealings. 

Instead she was lying on her stupid fucking couch in her stupid fucking apartment with nothing to live for but the fact that Dinah and Renee would probably be pissed if she offed herself now and that she hadn’t had her first kiss yet. Both of those facts were supremely embarrassing, almost violently embarrassing, and Helena groaned before pushing herself up and looking around. She needed to clean up. A collection of knives and arrows littered the floor in front of the window, her bed was unmade and inside-out black leather clothes were hanging off every available surface. 

Helena knew exactly what Maria Bertinelli would say if she could see the mess her daughter had made of her life.  _ Helena _ , she’d say in her clipped Italian,  _ you are the most important child in Gotham. Wash your face, change your clothes, and smile, darling daughter. Your brother is a mess. You aren’t allowed to be.  _ Her babbo would have laughed indulgently, kissed Helena’s head;  _ Leave my little dove alone, Maria. She can be forgetful if she wishes, so can Pino. They are just children.  _

Well, Helena wasn’t a child anymore, and Pino always would be. She was a fucking adult now, who needed to make fucking grown up decisions, like answering the phone that was buzzing so violently it nearly fell off the coffee table. Renee was calling her for the fifth time in twenty minutes because she was incapable of taking a goddamn hint and Helena swore viciously before she answered her phone. 

“Renee, this better be a fucking emergency.” Helena said, sucking her teeth. “I know you’re like, a million years old, but you know how to send a text.” 

“Don’t disrespect your fucking elders. I know how to send a text, but you’ve never answered a text in your life. Do I need to send you a motherfucking letter?” 

“What is it? I’m in the middle of something.”

“Sorry to interrupt your busy afternoon of chucking knives around and jerking off, Helena.” 

“Please go fuck yourself. You have ten seconds before I hang up the phone and return to my busy afternoon of chucking knives around and jacking off.” 

“We’re going out tonight. The Stacked Deck. If you’re not there by eleven I’m coming over to that dungeon you call an apartment and dragging you there myself.” 

“You’re five feet tall and I have knives. What exactly do you think you’re going to do to get me to come out?”

“Bust your kneecaps, you son of a bitch. Don’t be late or Dinah will beat your ass.” Renee hung up and Helena tossed her phone across the room onto her bed. Jesus. Really? Helena hated clubs, she hated being out past midnight, and more than anything she hated being strongarmed into leaving the house only for Dinah and Renee to talk her into getting tanked and waking up face-down on Renee’s on-and-off girlfriend’s front stoop with no idea how she got there. It had happened more than once and Helena was fairly certain if it happened again Ellen was going to either call the police or move. 

Now, did she risk getting her ass kicked by both Renee and Dinah for not going out or risk getting absolutely smashed and ending up on a roof with no keys and no wallet? Neither of them sounded like great options, but Helena could always leave her wallet at home. She groaned, got up, and walked over to the sink. She had a bathroom door, once, but an ambush at her house had taken out the flimsy plywood and left dents all over the off-white tiles. 

_ Helena, you are the most important child in Gotham _ . 

She looked at herself in the mirror. Short dark hair, dark eyes, pale skin, angry mouth and nose and chin, if her hair was curly and her eyebrows softer, she’d be staring at Maria Bertinelli in the dingy bathroom cabinet. Helena had always resembled her mother, never her father, much to his chagrin, but Pino had been a dead ringer for their father. 

_ Wash your face.  _

The water was cold, once it had bothered her but she had heard somewhere cold water was better for you, and she scrubbed at her face until her skin was dripping, drops of freezing water running down her neck. Her nose, thankfully, had stopped bleeding, though there was an unfortunate bruise at her temple, and her lip was split. There wasn’t much to do about either of those things, Helena had no real superpowers, she couldn’t heal herself or shapeshift or do any of the other shit actual superheros could do, but she didn’t really care. 

_ Change your clothes _ . 

Helena dug around in her closet until she found jeans, black, one of the knees was ripped and they were a little too short. She didn’t own much that wasn’t black or ill-fitting in some way, except for her suit, but if they were going out to a club, her fucking superhero costume wasn’t exactly appropriate attire. The shirt she managed to scrounge up was grey instead of black, though charcoal-grey wasn’t that far off, it was also cropped way too high and a slash of pale skin was out. 

_ Smile, darling daughter.  _

Despite the fact that she had nothing to smile about, Helena smiled at the mirror. It was more of a grimace, really, it looked like there was a gun to her head, and she dropped the smile, her face settling back into the usual displeased expression it normally wore. She always looked vaguely annoyed, her mother had always told her it was the set of her jaw, but the expression suited her, so she had no interest in changing it. 

Helena combed her hair with her fingers, it wasn’t long enough to warrant a brush, and decided to skip makeup. She did, however, slide on her fingerless gloves and make sure there was a knife tucked into the waist of her jeans and that the tattoo on the right side of her ribcage was suitably covered. Once her boots were on, calf-high and with metal reinforcing the toes and heels, Helena checked the time on her phone. Fuck. It was six-thirty. 

She could clean up, maybe toss her clothes back into her closet, make her bed, yank the arrows out of the wall and put them away. Or she could flop onto the couch, cross her legs at the ankles, and think about nothing for five hours. 

Better idea, if she was being honest. Helena yawned, folded one of her arms behind her head, and shut her eyes. 

Nearly a year after killing Victor Zsasz and she was still entirely unsure of her purpose in this world. She had killed every single person involved in the death of her family, helped defeat Roman Sionis and reclaimed the Bertinelli fortune. Everything she had set out to do after returning to Gotham, she had done. She had distributed the money from her family’s bank accounts between them; half had gone to Cassandra Cain to be accessible once she turned eighteen (it was mostly so Harley couldn’t blow every cent on the closest sparkly thing she could find) and divided the rest in four, some for Renee, some for Dinah, some for Harley, and some for her. Helena felt that the division was fair, Cass was a good kid and the money would help her get her life off to the right start, while the sums that had gone to Renee and Dinah and Harley were enough to make sure they could live comfortably. They deserved it. 

Helena hadn’t mentioned to them that she had kept less than a quarter of her own share of the money and sent the rest to Sal, Luca, and Massimo. Besides the fact that it was none of their business, Helena knew damn well Harley would never stop making fun of her for it. It wasn’t Helena’s fault she cared about the three men who had raised her and trained her, and it sure as hell wasn’t Helena’s fault that Harley hadn’t had people who cared about her when she was young. 

She spoke to Sal and Luca and Massimo at least once every two weeks, long-distance calls were expensive, and they told her the same thing every time.  _ We love you. We’re very proud of you. Come back and visit soon, picci.  _ Helena was nearly twenty-five and they still called her kiddo, which would have been annoying if it wasn’t the closest thing to affection Helena had received in a very long time. 

The thing was, there was nothing objectively wrong with Helena’s life. Actually, she had a pretty alright life. She had enough money to live off for the next twenty years, she had a small group of friends who she liked and who liked her, god only knew why, and her job was beating up criminals. But not in a cop way. Helena tried not to hold Renee’s former career against her, but she fucking hated cops. The Gotham City PD had failed her in every possible way as a child and as an adult, they hadn’t done much better. Not a bad life at all, really. 

But she wasn’t fulfilled. Helena had read enough self-help articles (she didn’t have the patience to read an entire book dedicated to stupid shrink language) to know that she should have been fufilled or something. She was pretty sure, anyways, most of the articles were behind paywalls and she refused to pay actual money to read dumb shit she could have gotten from Ellen during one of her famous  _ inner peace _ lectures. There was nothing she was aspiring to do, except maybe kiss a woman, and that was still hit-or-miss on the basis of the fact that Helena couldn’t actually talk to women without feeling like she was going to vomit on her own feet. 

Except Renee, Harley, Cassandra, Ellen, and Dinah, and even Dinah sometimes made Helena nervous. She had never quite mastered the art of conversation, especially in English, and Dinah once described her as “a robot who read one wikiHow article about how to have human conversations”. After Renee had described what wikiHow actually was to her, Helena had taken offence, but Dinah wasn’t wrong. Luca had odd rules about silence and from ages nine to seventeen Helena had gone half the year without saying a single word. Unsurprisingly, a code of silence being enforced as she went through puberty had a bit of an impact on her social developement and even after telling Luca his rules were stupid and refusing to keep her vow of silence after she had turned seventeen, she was still iffy with actually talking to people. 

Maybe she should get a cat. Maybe she should get two cats. Harley and Cass had a pet hyena, and cats weren’t too different from Bruce, Helena didn’t think. She liked cats, mostly, her parents had never let her have pets and Pino had always whined viciously about it, but she had spent a lot of her seventh year begging her parents to get her a kitten. Helena propped herself up on her elbows, halfway to googling the nearest animal shelter, when she spotted the knives buried in three out of four walls and the dents all over the bathroom and sank back down. If someone broke into her apartment, she could defend herself. A cat could not defend themself, and if her cat died because of her Helena wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to forgive herself. 

She did, though, check the time on her phone and made a very unladylike noise when 1900 flashed on the screen. Only? Helena grumbled, a sound magnified by the utter silence of her home, and flopped back down onto the couch. If she was going to be out all night, a nap would probably be a good idea. 


	2. ii: alcohol creates just as many problems as it solves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Helena, Dinah, and Renee go drinking. It goes about as well as you'd expect.

“Do you always have to dress like that?” Dinah asked, her heels propped on the table in front of them as she fiddled with her drink with a straw and cocked a brow at Helena. She was only on her third drink and had already started playing a very fun game called _Picking apart the life of my friends while I’m getting drunk so they won’t take offense. Round One: Helena._

Helena, trapped between Renee and Dinah in the circular booth at the back of the Stacked Deck, looked down at herself and then back at up at Dinah. “Like what?” They had very wisely jammed Helena between them so she wouldn’t make an escape attempt at any point during the evening. (Once, Helena had bolted while Renee and Dinah were taking shots and ever since, she’d be either imprisoned between them in a booth or something she needed was stolen so she couldn’t leave. Renee had once threatened to buy her a toddler leash and Helena had very wisely chosen to hand over her keys every time they went out.)

Dinah shrugged, watching Helena take a very small sip of the amaretto on ice sitting in front of her. Helena didn’t drink often and when sober, she was very picky about what she drank. When she was drunk, Renee normally had to keep her from drinking hand sanitizer while Dinah encouraged her to eat the Purell. Renee was texting furiously and sucking down a beer the size of her head, Helena had to assume it was Ellen because Renee texted no one else back that fast. 

“You could wear, like, not black. Do we need to take you shopping? Renee, should we take Helena shopping?” 

“No.” Helena said at the same time Renee nodded furiously, turning her phone off and looking up at them for the first time all night. “We should not take Helena shopping. I’m wearing grey. That’s not black.” 

“A dark grey shirt doesn’t count as not black. Do you own anything not black? And if you say grey or brown or dark purple I will smack the shit out of you.” 

Helena, who had been about to claim she owned a brown leather jacket and several dark grey and purple shirts, shut her mouth. Dinah took a long swig of her drink, it was bright blue and smelled of candy, and took Helena’s hand across the table. The fingerless gloves kept their palms from touching, but Dinah’s fingers were brushing hers and Helena took a very deep breath at the contact.

“Helena Bertinelli, I am begging you to let me take you shopping. Please. I am starting to get embarrassed when we go out in public. You look like a sullen teenager with the abs of a steroid junkie and the social skills of a cat that just turned into a human. Your abs are delightful and there’s nothing I can do about the fact that you remind me of an animated car dealership inflatable, but I can get you clothes that don’t make you look like you’ve just looted the wardrobe department from the Matrix.” 

After Renee had explained the Matrix and car dealership inflatables, Helena scowled at Dinah and pulled her hand away to take another tiny sip of her drink. It paled in comparison to the stuff she had grown up drinking, but it wasn’t bad, so she could manage. She’d move on from amaretto as soon as she finished this glass, probably switching to whatever sugar-flavoured garbage Dinah was drinking, and three drinks later whatever was cheapest would do. 

“I like how I dress.” Helena muttered, tapping her fingers on the table. The bar was loud, music and talking and the crack of pool cues from across the room, and Dinah had to lean closer to hear her speak. “I don’t want to dress a barbie doll someone really fucked up.” 

“That was terrible.” Renee said without hesitation, shutting down what Helena thought wasn’t that bad. Dinah snorted into her drink and said nothing, letting Renee go on. “She’s right, you know. I don’t think it would kill you to wear something that actually fits and isn’t a dark colour. It might help you not look like you’re about to snap someone’s neck with your bare hands.” 

“I wear clothes that fit. And bright colours make me look sickly.” 

“Everything you wear looks like you haven’t bought new clothes since your goth phase. You don’t even have to buy anything. I just want to see you in something nice. Please? I’ll buy you a drink?” 

“If I go shopping, will you leave me alone about my life choices?” 

“Probably not. But I’ll buy you a drink.” 

Helena threw back the rest of her drink and pushed the glass across the table, rolling her eyes as wide as she could so Dinah could see. Dinah clapped her hands together, grinning, and plucked Renee’s phone from her hand. “Great. We’re playing pool. Come on.” 

Oddly enough, Helena had a knack for pool. Dinah made them play every time they went to the Stacked Deck, which was too often, and once she realized that pool boiled down to aiming well, it wasn’t really that hard. It also pissed Renee off to no end, because _I’ve been playing for twenty years and this twenty-something shit comes out of isolation in fucking Italy and beats the fuck out of me._

Helena trailed Renee and Dinah to the corner table, currently being used by a pair of tall men covered in tattoos, and tucked her hands into her pockets as Dinah walked up to the bigger of the two. Renee hung back a bit, swinging her bottle by the neck, and Helena watched as Dinah said something to the man she couldn’t hear. Dinah had a habit of bullying men out of anything she could, seats and tables and pool games and the occasional car, and while Renee provided verbal backup, Helena normally just crossed her arms over her chest and tried to look intimidating, which worked on most men and some women. (She spent a lot of time on her scary face in the mirror.)

“You can wait your turn, sweetheart.” The taller man looked down his nose at Dinah and curled his lip. Christ, he was ugly, he looked like someone had beat his face into ground beef several times, and several of his teeth flashed gold in the light from the lamp hanging from the ceiling. “I ain’t giving up my game to a couple of bitches.” 

In Dinah’s eyes, sweetheart was worse than bitch, and Helena took an automatic step back and made sure her knife was still tucked into the waist of her jeans. Dinah didn’t look particularly threatening, she wasn’t very tall and wore a lot of makeup and had obnoxiously endearing dimples, but god help any man who challenged her, as challenging Dinah Lance normally ended in either tinnitus or a brain bleed. Usually both. 

“Say that again, motherfucker.” Dinah glared up at the man as the other one circled the table to stand beside him. For the love of God. Renee nudged Helena very gently in the side and they both stepped forwards in case they needed to drag Dinah away before she got them banned from one of the only bars in Gotham City that let them through the front door. “Say that to my fucking face.” 

“I said,” The man bent down so he and Dinah were eye to eye and oh fuck. If there was one thing Dinah hated more than being called condescending pet names by strange men, it was someone making fun of her height. Anyone except Helena and Renee, and even then you had to tread very carefully. “I ain’t giving up my fuckin’ game to a grandma, a little girl, and whatever the fuck she is.” 

The pool cue hit the man in the head so hard Helena heard the wet thud of skull against brain and he crashed backwards into the pool table, brightly-coloured balls spilling onto the floor at Helena and Renee’s feet. Dinah cracked the cue over her knee and the heavier end was an inch from breaking the second man’s nose when Helena caught it in her palm, the blow going directly through the thick leather of her gloves and making her wince. Ordinarly, Helena would happily join in, but the Stacked Deck was the nicest of the three bars in Gotham where they weren’t permanently banned, and if Dinah killed two men on the premises they would have to start frequenting either Noonan’s or Molly’s and according to Renee, neither of those were great options. 

“Call me a little girl again, you pussy!” Dinah yelled as Helena picked her up and tossed her over one shoulder, a technique she had managed to perfect for when Dinah got drunk and belligerent and started trying to beat up random men (It was that or Helena grabbed her armpits and Renee held her feet, which had stopped after Dinah had kicked one of Renee’s teeth loose in her struggle). Helena and Dinah were evenly matched in terms of strength but Helena was a good half a foot taller, which meant she could lift Dinah over her shoulder with not that much effort. “I fucking thought so! You stupid fucking-” 

Helena elbowed the door open and bumped Dinah’s head a little harder than necessary against the frame, earning a fist to the back, and Helena tried to ignore the way she had to hold Dinah by the back of her upper thighs to make sure she didn’t fall and the way Dinah’s fist had lingered for a second too long on the bare skin of her back. Renee led the way across the street, and only when the door to the Stacked Deck had swung closed did Helena set Dinah down on the curb. 

“I could have fucking taken him.” Dinah muttered, brushing herself off in several exaggerated motions. Her makeup was smudged around the eyes, as if they were ringed in dark circles, and the ring between her nostrils was crooked. Straightening it would have been weird, so Helena didn’t, but she wanted to, which was almost even more weird. 

“Easy. But if you kicked his ass in the middle of the bar, we’d get booted, and I’m not going back to fucking Noonan’s.” Renee said, and Helena, despite having never stepped foot in Noonan’s, nodded her assent. Her mouth tasted like almonds and unpleasant sweetness and she reached into the pocket of her jacket to retrieve the pack of mints she always kept in there. 

_Fresh breath, passerotta. One package of amìentas in your purse at all times, never less than three in the package. Tuck it between your teeth and your lip, let it melt, and then spread it very lightly over your tongue. People will trust you more if you keep your hygiene flawless. They will want to be your friend instead of your enemy, and you need more friends than enemies._

“I’m not in the mood to bar hop.” Dinah furrowed her brow at the same time Helena remembered they hadn’t paid for their drinks, but she had a feeling returning to the Deck now would end fairly poorly. Meh. If the owner hadn’t chased them down to pay for two small glasses of amaretto, a cheap beer, and three gross blue drinks, Helena wasn’t going to go back. “But the night is still young. Robin Hood, how clean is your place?” 

“Filthy.” It was the same thing they always did, Dinah and Renee would try to invite themselves over to Helena’s apartment, Helena told them it was dirty or that a pipe had burst, and they would end up at Dinah’s or Renee’s. Helena couldn’t stand having people in her home, it was the only place that was hers and no one else’s, it belonged to her and she had never once had a visitor in the eleven months she had lived there. “Renee?” 

“Same. Dinah?” 

“I cleaned yesterday, but we’d better stop to buy something to drink.” 

And that was that. Somehow, Renee and Dinah made Helena feel at ease, they understood her, mostly, and she understood them. Mostly. Helena was severely out of practice when it came to understanding others, it had never been necessary in Sicily, she had no friends there, and when she had returned to Gotham she had been more concerned with murder than getting to know people. But now she had Renee, who confided in her about problems with Ellen and told her to her face when she had fucked up, and Dinah, who talked to her about anything and everything without stopping and told men to get fucked when they made vile comments. And she talked to them. She told them about her parents, a little, and a little about her upbringing. Not about feelings, though, because Helena liked to pretend she didn’t have any. 

Renee led the way, despite the fact they were going to Dinah’s apartment, Renee knew the streets of Gotham better than anyone and none of them had driven. Helena didn’t actually know how to drive, Massimo had taught her how to ride a motorcycle when she had turned fifteen and she had never really seen the need to learn how to drive a car. Dinah had a convertible and Renee drove a truck she refused to repair, a massive ugly thing that Helena hated riding in, and while none of them were particularly responsible, drunk driving was something none of them did. 

So they walked. Dinah lived about fifteen blocks from Helena and somehow in a much nicer apartment despite the quality of the neighbourhood remaining the same. The streetlights were on, casting three long shadows across the sidewalk and onto the road as they walked, and Renee was complaining about how fast Dinah and Helena walked by the time they reached the liquor store Dinah frequented. 

“Not my goddamn fault you two walk like someone is fucking chasing you.” Renee grumbled, running her fingers along the lower shelves of bottles. In her defense, Helena walked as quickly as most people ran and Dinah kept pace all the time, she claimed it was how fast she normally walked but Helena knew she just refused to be slower (Harley had once referred to Helena as the strongest Bird of Prey and to this day Dinah held it against both of them). “I want whiskey. Lots.” 

“One bottle.” Dinah selected a bottle of something pink, tilted it in the light, and put it back down on the shelf. Helena picked up what looked like perfume, shook it beside her ear, and set it down where she had found it. She didn’t know exactly what that did, but it made her look like she knew what she was doing, and Helena found a bottle of something with a label she could read and figured that would do.

When Renee had chosen a startlingly large bottle of whiskey and Dinah had settled on a glass bottle full of vodka so red it looked like blood, they brought it up to the front counter. The short man behind the cash, older with a pair of thick glasses on a chain around his neck, squinted at them. Helena wondered what they must look like: three muscly women, one with a good decade or so on the other two, dressed as though they were all going to entirely different events (Renee was wearing a jacket and pants that screamed she had just put on whatever was at the top of her laundry hamper, Dinah was in tight gold pants and covered in gold jewellery, and Helena probably looked like she had a funeral to attend), all slightly drunk, at twelve twenty-nine am on a Thursday. Christ. 

“ID.” The man said, sliding his glasses onto his face. Dinah, who had Helena’s wallet so she wouldn’t make any escape attempts, set two plastic cards onto the counter with a snap so loud Helena knew she was annoyed. To be fair, neither Dinah or Helena were over twenty-five and neither of them appeared to be any older than fresh university graduates, but Renee had to dig around in her wallet for a good minute before producing her battered driver’s licence. 

Even upside-down, Helena knew what each ID said. Renee’s claimed she was thirty-nine, Dinah’s listed her height as two inches taller than she actually was, and Helena’s didn’t even have a middle name. But the pictures were of them, grainy as they might be, and there was nothing on the cards to indicate that they were fake. _Helena Balzaretti, Dinah Lance, Renee Montoya._ Dinah and Renee’s both indicated they were allowed to drive cars and Helena’s verified her as a motorcycle driver. Renee had tried to teach Helena to drive her truck, once, but she had managed to knock off both side mirrors and blow a tire on a trip around the block and now she was permanently banished to the back seat. (In Helena’s defense, Renee’s truck was super old and way bigger than the sleek bike locked in the basement garage of her apartment building, but she had even been forced into the back when they took Dinah’s car, which she had never driven because Dinah loved that car more than she loved tight gold pants.)

Renee started to take out a few crumpled bills but Dinah waved her off, which would have been a very sweet gesture if Dinah hadn’t been reaching into Helena’s wallet instead of her own. The older man returned their IDs and gave them no change, no receipt, and no bag. If Helena cared more, she would have complained, but Dinah and Renee were already halfway out the door so she trailed them. 

Helena had been to Dinah’s apartment a few times, they spent more time at Renee’s because she had an actual house, and every time she was struck dumb by simply how Dinah it was. That made very little sense, but it was. Dinah lived in a pleasant one-bedroom she had painted gold and black and blue and silver, shoes littered the front hall and a heap of jackets spilled out of the open closet. Helena knelt down to unlace her boots, Dinah had a very strict rule about shoes in the house, and came face-to-face with a handful of dusty coins and a bottle cap. That kind of mess would have driven Helena insane, she had clothes and knives scattered everywhere but she cleaned three times a week. 

“Just make some space.” Dinah gestured at the bright red couch in the middle of the room as she entered the kitchen, pillows and blankets and remotes and bullets covered the cushions, and Helena opted to sit on the floor. She liked sitting on the floor, weirdly, it was easier to run if you weren’t sunk into the overstuffed couch like Renee was currently, and she had already inventoried every single exit, every place someone could enter, everything she could use as a weapon. 

Renee propped her feet on the coffee table beside Helena’s head, which didn’t bother her as much as it would have six months ago, and groaned, cracking every single one of her knuckles directly in Helena’s ear. That bothered her, but Dinah had brought over three mismatched glasses and settled on the other side of the couch. 

“As if I need a glass.” Renee broke the seal on her bottle and brought the lip of the bottle directly to her lips, gulping down way more whiskey than Helena could ever imagine drinking in one night, let alone in a single swallow. Dinah rolled her eyes and filled a glass jar halfway up with the drink Helena had picked, she still didn’t know what it was, and stuck a bright green swirly straw inside. “Gimme one of those, though.” 

When they were settled, Helena and Dinah using cups and Renee sucking whiskey from a twisty straw faster than should be possible, Dinah tossed a bullet casing at Helena’s head and pulled a face. “When can we go shopping?” 

“Well, you know I have such a busy personal life, so I’m not sure when I’ll really be able to clear out an hour or two.” 

“Fuck you, first of all, and if you think me taking you shopping is going to take any less than three days you’re insane. Renee, are you coming, or are you letting me wrestle Helena into clothes that have some colour and fit her properly alone?” 

“No, I’ll come. But I reserve the right to boo and throw tomatoes and make mean comments that neither of you take to heart.”

“Deal.” 

Helena made a face and took a sip of her drink, which was cherry-flavoured and not entirely terrible. It didn’t taste strong, which meant it was, and she poured a bit more into her glass and swished it around. Shopping. Gross. Helena wore black and grey and purple and men’s underwear and vintage leather and she was fine with that. She had her gear for when they went out as the Birds of Prey, three pairs of shoes, two jackets, and a single nice outfit she had never once worn. Did she need more than that? 

“Cool. Dare I ask what’s going on with you and Ellen, or are you two still dancing around being in an actual relationship again?” Dinah stirred her drink with her straw, ice cubes clattering against the rim, and stared at Renee. She was almost incapable of sitting still, Dinah was always moving, always tapping her fingers or fiddling with her jewellery or bouncing her leg, it was as if she had to expend energy at all times or she’d explode. 

“Dancing around.” Renee took an even larger slug of her whiskey, Jesus Christ Renee could stomach a lot of alcohol. (Helena still wondered how such a small person could take down nine beers in a night and still function as a human being in the morning, after three drinks Helena got fuzzy and she was a solid half foot taller than Renee). “Aren’t we always?” 

Dinah shrugged. “As long as I’ve known you.” Renee and Dinah had known each other for longer than Helena had known either of them, Helena had never asked how long but she’d guess a few years, at least, and every time an inside joke or a reference was made, there was that sharp, sudden pain in her chest. 

And it wasn’t their fault, of course. If Helena had known them for longer, it would have been because they were hunting her down, because she would have been their enemy. If she had stayed in Gotham, lived by her parents’ rules, done what they had planned for her, she wouldn’t be sitting in Dinah’s apartment drinking cherry liquor out of a swirly straw, discussing plans to buy her some new clothes. If she had stayed in Gotham, she would have been Helena Rosa Bertinelli, mafiosa, head of the Bertinelli crime family, with a warrant out for her arrest and a very large price on her head. 

But she was not her father. She was not her mother. She was Helena, Huntress, the Crossbow Killer, an orphan and a vigilante and a Bird of Prey. She was stronger than her parents ever had been, better than her parents had ever been, and as Dinah proposed a toast, as Helena lifted her glass and clinked it against Dinah’s cup and Renee’s bottle, she knew that despite everything, it was worth it.


	3. iii: an apple a day keeps helena from dying of vitamin b deficiency

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> someone owns no nice clothes.

Helena woke up face-down on her bed with no memory of how she’d gotten there. Her head hurt and her mouth tasted like the floor of a bar and her pants were tangled around her shins. Jesus Christ. She rolled over, twisting up her jeans even further, and winced when the sunlight pouring in the open window hit her face. It was ten at least, probably later, she didn’t have a wall clock and the time on the oven was just out of her view. 

“Ugh.” She was still wearing her sweater, only now it was hiked up around her stomach, and she probably stank of sweat and stale liquor. She sniffed her shirt. Okay, she definitely stank of sweat and stale liquor. Helena sat up, kicked her pants off all the way, and took very deliberate steps towards the bathroom. She felt like death, but a shower and something to eat would probably get her back to rights. 

The water was cold, pouring over her hair and face and chest and back, and Helena let the spray shock her system until she was wide awake and miserable but not sluggish or aching anymore. Three bottles of product were lined up on the lip of the bathtub, one purple and one white and one clear, the same products her mother used. 

_“Passerotta,” Maria says as she poured a small amount of shampoo into her hand, “This is what you want to use. It keeps your hair healthy and clean, helps it to grow long.” Helena sits with her back against the edge of the tub, her knees tucked to her chest, listening intently to her mother while warm water swirls around her. She is seven, small and pale and quiet, and she learns from her mother so one day she will take her father’s place._

_“Start at the roots,” Maria uses the tips of her fingers to work the shampoo into Helena’s hair, working her way down Helena’s long dark hair. Seven and her hair is already thick, long, lovely, it doesn’t curl like her mother’s but falls in a dark curtain her mother normally braids tightly or does with clips and ribbons. Her hair is heavy and it tugs at her scalp, when it’s wet it makes her head hurt, but her mother loves her hair, so she does not complain. “Leave the tips alone. The shampoo will run down, and if you use too much it will get dry. Do you hear me, sweet girl?”_

_“Yes, mamma.” Helena’s voice is gentle and her mother rinses the shampoo from her hair in a few motions. Before her mother can continue, Pino barges into the bathroom, his mess of curls tangled and a stain down the front of his pyjama shirt. He is four and resembles their father more every day, strong nose and eyes so brown they’re nearly black, and he falls into their mother’s lap and lets Maria press a kiss to his head._

_“Are you clean yet, Lela?” Pino cannot yet pronounce Helena properly, his Sicilian is halting and his English is somehow worse, but he doesn’t need to be fluent. Helena is older, she will take their father’s place, and Pino will do what their Uncle Tomasso does, run around with women and reap the rewards of the work their father puts in. Helena will lead the family and Pino will do as he pleases and sometimes Helena envies him._

_“Soon, polpetto.” Maria kisses Pino’s head again, her hands working conditioner through Helena’s hair, and Helena can feel Pino’s sticky breath on the back of her neck. She loves her brother, truly, he is sweet and silly and everyone dotes on him. Helena is not doted on, but she is her father’s daughter and so she will not complain._

Helena stuck her face under the icy water to banish the memory, forcing the thought of Pino back into the cage at the back of her brain where it belonged. Pino would be twenty-one, an adult, she mused, though she knew he’d still have the same dark curly hair and bright eyes and deep dimples, he’d probably be able to pronounce Helena but call her Lele to bother her. He might have still gone by Pino, he might have switched to Giuseppe or Joe or Joey, he might have been so many things. 

She stayed in the shower until her teeth were chattering, letting the cold water wash away the thought of Pino and who he might have been, rinsing sweat and alcohol and the pain of the vicious hangover from her skin, and only when she thought she might seriously get hypothermia did she turn the shower off and wrap herself in a towel. Helena’s hair was plastered to her head in soaked strands, dripping water down her back and shoulders, and she braced a hand on either side of the sink and glared at the woman staring at her in the mirror. 

_Straighten up_ , Helena swore she could feel her mother’s hands on her shoulders, wrenching them back so her posture was impeccable. _Chin high, mouth strong, don’t look down. You are strong, my Helena, and you need to prove it. Men will think you are weak because you are a girl, but you cannot forget that you are much stronger than they will ever be._

“Are you proud of me, Mamma?” Helena asked, to no one, she was really only speaking aloud so something would break the silence, watching herself in the mirror. She was her mother’s daughter, through and through, but her mother would hate who she had become. “Are you proud of what I’ve done? Are you-”

Someone knocked at the door, interrupting Helena’s train of thought so violently she flinched, tucking her towel tighter around herself and crossing to the door. No one knew where she lived. No one. She didn’t order delivery, didn’t have people over, didn’t send or receive mail. She was fairly certain even Dinah and Renee didn’t know where she lived, except maybe if they followed her home. Which they wouldn’t do, because that would be weird (not entirely outside the realm of possibility, but weird). 

Helena stooped to peer through the peephole, and there stood Dinah, one hand in her pocket as she knocked again. Christ. Had Dinah followed her home? And how wasn’t she as viciously hungover as Helena? Friday morning and Dinah looked as fresh-faced as always, she got on her toes and pressed her eye to the opposite side of the peephole to try and stare back at Helena. 

“I can hear you breathing. Gonna let me in?” Dinah offered a smile, half of a smile, flashing her dimples, and rapped on the door a third time. “I’m worried I might get robbed if I stay out here much longer.” 

The idea of someone trying to rob Dinah was laughable, but it was the only reason Helena took the chain off the door and undid the lock, keeping one hand braced on the knob so Dinah couldn’t bust in and see her mostly naked. Helena refused to be seen naked, ever, Dinah and Renee had never seen her in anything but the occasional pair of sweatpants and tank top, she didn’t like the idea of being so vulnerable, so exposed to people she actually liked. 

“Shut your eyes and don’t open them.” Helena ordered before she let Dinah in, praying to God Dinah actually did. Dinah stepped into her apartment, the first visitor she’d ever had, with her eyes squeezed tightly closed and her arms stretched out in front of her. “Don’t move.” 

“Yes sir.” Dinah saluted, one arm still waving around in front of her like she was trying to swat a very large bug, and Helena leaned back just enough to keep Dinah’s hand from smacking full force into her boob. “Can I ask why?” 

“I just got out of the shower. Can I ask how the fuck you found out where I live?” 

“Sure. You keep your bike in the garage underneath this building. Using my superpowers, I deducted that you live in this building, and because you live in a very terrible building, there is no lock on the front door. You don’t like that I live on the second floor of my building because you think it’s too low down, and there are three floors in this building with one apartment each. So, you live here.”

Helena did up the button on her jeans, different than last night but still black, and frowned at Dinah’s back. She was right, but the fact that Dinah had actually remembered that she hated living anywhere but the top floor was weird. No one remembered things about her. It was her thing. Helena preferred going unnoticed, it had helped her kill the men who had murdered her family and it helped her in most things in life. 

“Can I open my eyes now?” Dinah went on, she had actually kept her eyes closed and her back turned the entire time, and Helena tucked her grey long-sleeve into her pants before nodding. She realised a solid ten seconds after nodding that Dinah couldn’t see her nod with her eyes shut and back turned, and Dinah knew, somehow, what she had done. “I’m going to assume you nodded and didn’t realise I can’t see you nodding.” 

“Are you sure your superpowers aren’t mindreading?” Helena towelled off her hair and watched Dinah turn around, her eyes darting around Helena’s apartment for the first time. A pile of clothes, arrows and knives, sheets tangled on a bed, and a sagging couch. Helena didn’t own a TV, she didn’t have a coffee table or a kitchen table or a bathroom door, she ate her meals on the couch or standing up and when she did watch TV, it was at Dinah’s or Renee’s or on her phone. “Welcome, I guess. Is there an emergency that requires you to bust into my home at an ungodly hour or is this just for fun?”

“One in the afternoon isn’t an ungodly hour.” Dinah sat down on the arm of the couch, narrowly avoiding stabbing herself in the ass with a knife, and watched Helena toss her towel onto the floor and begin digging around for some socks. “And your wardrobe, or lack thereof, is what I would consider an emergency. Renee’s waiting downstairs and before you complain, last night I was promised in writing that you’d let me take you shopping today.”

“It doesn’t count if I was drunk.” 

“Does so. You signed it and everything.” 

“Let me see.” Helena took the piece of paper Dinah had taken out of her jacket and while she was fairly certain contracts scribbled on the back of Chinese food receipts weren’t legally binding, it was a solid start. _I, Huntress, swear that I will allow Dinah Lance and Renee Montoya to take me shopping because I wear bleak-ass clothes and I need to fix that so Dinah and Renee will still be seen with me in public. Signed, Helena Bertinelli, AKA Huntress._ “Fuck.” 

“Great. Put your boots on and let’s go. Renee hates waiting.” Renee did hate waiting, hated it as much as she hated avocados and being sober for more than two days in a row, and the longer Helena and Dinah made Renee wait the more they’d have to listen to her bitch about them making her wait. Helena shoved her feet into dark brown boots, they were worn white in some places and the laces were frayed but she refused to buy new ones, and shrugged into her jacket. She hadn’t eaten, but Helena mostly ate protein bars and fruit and egg whites and chicken breasts and vegetables, so she stuck an apple between her teeth and figured she’d live.

“You could get a nicer place, you know.” Dinah said as Helena locked the door behind them, her keys jangling in the lock. “You’re like, super rich. You could buy back your family’s house if you wanted.” 

Helena didn’t want to buy back the site of her family’s brutal massacre, shockingly, and judging by the look on Dinah’s face as they headed down the stairs, she knew it too. “Yup. My bad, sorry. But you could seriously live somewhere with a proper lock on the front door. I got in so fast. It’s not safe.” 

“You seen these guns?” Helena rubbed the apple on her shirt before taking a bite, opening the door of Renee’s idling Jeep and crawling into the backseat. Renee sat in the front, her thumbs dancing over the screen of her phone, and finished her text before tossing her phone into the cupholder and putting her seatbelt on. “I’m good, Dinah. I like my place.” 

“Took you long enough. Is that all you’re eating?” Renee smacked Dinah’s thigh as soon as she propped her feet on the dash, making Dinah scowl and take her feet down, and Helena swallowed her mouthful of apple before answering. 

“Yeah. Eat an apple, the doctor dies.” 

“What? What the fuck did you just say?” Dinah craned her neck so she could look Helena in the eyes, her mouth hanging open as she looked at Helena. Shit. Helena’s English was near-perfect, but Sicilian was her first language and she knew that the sayings didn’t always translate properly. 

“Eat an apple and the doctor dies. Isn’t that what they say?”

“Who’s they? What are you fucking talking about? Do you mean an apple a day keeps the doctor away?” 

“That’s what I said.”

“The doctor doesn’t die! Please don’t say that in front of anyone else because I know what you mean, but no one else will. Renee, you need to back me up on this.”

“I hate getting involved in your weird arguments, but Helena, if you say that to literally anyone else in your life you’ll sound insane.” Renee made a left turn so sharp Helena nearly slammed into the side window, the apple nearly falling from Helena’s hand as she took another bite. It might have been the hangover, it might have been the fact that she didn’t drink a lot, but it was a really good apple. Maybe the best apple she’d ever eaten. 

Dinah laughed, loudly, and rolled her window down as they made another left turn. Were they going in circles? Actually, Helena didn’t know where they were going, just that Dinah had picked some stores, which did not mean anything good since Dinah based her clothing decisions on how much attention she could draw to herself. Renee wouldn’t pick anything, because she wore nothing but what you’d imagine a stereotype of a cop to wear and occasionally Ellen’s clothes that were nothing but a stereotype of a lawyer to wear (despite the fact that Ellen wasn’t actually a lawyer). 

“Where are we going?” Helena asked, sucking a piece of apple skin out of her teeth. They were in Burnside, which wasn’t the fanciest part of Gotham but was fancier than Helena would have liked, and Renee slammed into a parking spot at fifty miles an hour. Jesus. She nearly sent Dinah through the windshield because Dinah hadn’t bothered with a seatbelt and took her keys out of the ignition. “Fucking hell, Renee, are you trying to kill us?”

“It’s not my fault Dinah doesn’t put her fucking seatbelt on.” Renee locked her car as soon as they had all gotten out, she had to go around and lock each door individually because her car was that fucking old, and Dinah looked way too invigorated to be doing this. Renee was wearing aviators and her hair was tied up and she looked a little closer to how they should be looking after drinking all night. “How are you so fucking chipper, Dinah? It’s way too fucking early for this.” 

“Holy shit, both of you, it’s one thirty. One thirty is not way too fucking early. It’s fucking lunchtime. The sun is shining, the wind is blowing, it’s a beautiful fucking day!” 

Helena peered up at the sky. It was drizzling and the wind was freezing and while Helena didn’t mind the weather, a beautiful day it was fucking not. She told Dinah so and Dinah cuffed her in the back of the head, she had to reach up to do it. Helena chewed up the last few bites of her apple before they went into the first store and Renee swore as she watched Helena do it. 

“Are you a fucking goat? Please don’t tell me you just ate the fucking apple core. Please tell me I’m hallucinating or something. Jesus fucking Christ.” Renee lifted her sunglasses up just enough to look at Helena properly, she looked more disgusted than when they saw straight people kissing in public or that one time Dinah had kicked a man in the stomach so hard he had shit himself. 

Helena shrugged, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. She always ate apple cores and potato skins and shit like that, Luca didn’t believe in food waste and told her that the parts most people threw away were the best parts for you (best said with a heavy Italian accent and a few wild hand gestures). 

“Remind me why we take her out in public? For fuck’s sakes, you dress like an oversized teenaged goth and you eat apples whole.” 

“Fuck you. Can we just go get me clothes I hate?” 

“You’re not going to hate them. I have excellent taste.” Dinah, who was currently wearing a bright yellow jacket over a cropped red shirt that said Not Your Baby and jeans that were more rip than fabric over pink boots with flame decals, opened the glass door to the store and gestured for Helena and Renee to enter. “Renee, you can pick some stuff for her. Helena, go wait in the corner.” 

Helena did as she was told, leaning back against the far wall and tucking one ankle behind the other. It was a small store, racks of shirts and pants and jackets lined the walls and no one was in there except the employees, and the idea of Dinah having free reign over a store and picking her clothes made Helena want to curl up into a ball and die. 

“Shorts! Thoughts?” Dinah called across the tables of folded pants and sweaters, somehow she already had seven things in her arms, and Helena shook her head vigorously. She actively refused to wear pants that didn’t come down to mid-calf at minimum, partially because she was constantly cold and partially because she had no interest in the comments that would inevitably be thrown her way if she wore shorts. Whenever Dinah wore shorts (Renee had told them on multiple occasions she’d rather die than wear anything but jeans) men said such vile things that Helena had to actively stop herself from beating the shit out of them. “Why not? You’ve got great legs!” 

“You’ve never seen my legs!” 

“Not for lack of trying!” 

A joke, of course, Dinah flashed her charming grin at Helena before returning to picking out clothes, but Helena felt a prickle run down her spine nonetheless. Not a bad prickle, necessarily, but it was a weird feeling and she didn’t want to feel it and she didn’t want to think about Dinah like that because it would be weird to think about her teammate like that and Dinah flirted with everybody and everything (Helena had once seen her make eyes at a pair of shoes) but-

“Finding everything okay?” One of the women behind the counter, tall and blonde and pretty, asked, in that unpleasant way salespeople talked to Dinah and Renee when they went to nice places. Renee ignored the woman entirely, she was examining a pale blue shirt that Helena really didn’t want to try on, and Dinah looked up with a tight smile. 

“Could we start a fitting room?” She matched the woman’s tone exactly and managed to look down her nose despite the woman’s height, Dinah had mastered the disdainful look people gave her and always sent it back twice as hard. “Thanks so much.” 

She handed the woman her armful of clothes, which had managed to double in the two minutes since Helena had looked up at her last, without waiting for an answer. The woman pressed her lips into a thin line and she glanced over at Helena. Ah. Helena walked over to Dinah instead, taking a dark red dress out of her hands and returning it to the rack. 

“Rude.” Dinah clicked her tongue and moved on to a pair of red-and-black striped pants. Jesus Christ. Was Dinah trying to kill her? Helena didn’t wear flashy clothes. When she was a child, she had worn whatever clothes her mother had put her in, mostly dresses and skirts and sweaters, and then she had worn whatever Sal and Luca and Massimo could scrounge up, and then she had worn the clothes she thought looked decent. No bright colours, no stripes, no skirts, no dresses. Black and grey and brown and purple, men’s boxers, the occasional bra. Not much more. She hadn’t really realized there was anything wrong with how she dressed until Renee and Dinah had begun to tease her about it. 

When Dinah had picked out an absurd amount of clothes and Renee had chosen maybe three things, Helena was nudged into a fitting room with all the stuff. Holy shit. Dinah had gotten her stripes and plaids and patterns of tiny pineapples and flowers and birds. Nothing that Helena ever wore, ever. Her mother would hate all of it.   
The first shirt was striped red and yellow and white, it had short sleeves and a collar and Helena didn’t hate it. Honestly, it looked decent. She twisted in the mirror, she could see her bra through the thin fabric but she didn’t actually need to wear a bra so it didn’t matter so much. She changed into a pair of jeans that weren’t black, they were light blue and shockingly nice, and Dinah tapped on the door impatiently. 

“Have you ever waited for anything in your life?” Helena asked, slipping out of the fitting room so Dinah and Renee, sitting on the couch across from the door, could see the outfit. Renee looked her up and down and nodded, as close to a compliment as Renee was normally willing to give, and Dinah smiled widely and clapped her hands together. 

“Renee, I’m a fucking genius. You see this? I should be a stylist or something. Helena, do the white button-down and the stripey pants. Tuck the shirt in the pants.” Dinah elbowed Renee in the ribs, mostly unnecessary because Renee was already paying attention and Dinah’s elbows were like knives, and pointed at the changeroom again. 

At least an hour later, Renee was taking large sips from her travel mug that was not full of coffee and Dinah had decided that everything Helena had tried on needed to be bought. The saleswomen looked fucking pissed, they were both eyeing Dinah and Renee with disdain, and they were completely lovely to Helena, despite Helena doing the exacct same thing as Dinah and Renee. It was super fucking obnoxious and Helena was tempted to call them out on it, but it absoloutely not her place. 

“I don’t know if I have enough room at my place for all this, Dinah.” Helena examined the heap of clothes Dinah decided must be bought, she really didn’t have a lot of space in her apartment and she’d probably have to store the shirts in the oven or something. She didn’t cook a lot. “Can you pick like, twenty things that are your favourites and I’ll get those?” 

“Forty.” 

“Twenty-five.” 

“Thirty-five.” 

“Thirty.” 

“Done.” Dinah looked very pleased with herself, she had probably wanted thirty all along, and she began to pick through the clothes. Renee offered Helena a sip from the travel mug, she was still wearing her sunglasses, and Helena took a small sniff. The sniff nearly burned her nose hairs off and she handed it back, grimacing. Was Renee drinking fucking rubbing alcohol? It wouldn’t be the first or the last time. 

Dinah gathered up the clothes she had picked, the most ostentatious shirts and pants, Helena noted with a scowl, and led them to the counter. She was always so calm, so confident, even when the two saleswomen were looking at her like she was a piece of spinach picked out of their teeth, and Helena knew that she could emulate Dinah for a thousand years and never have that energy. 

“Will you be paying cash or with a card?” The blonde woman asked once she had rung up a thousand dollars worth of clothes, her eyes darting between Helena and Dinah (Renee had wandered away, unsurprisingly) warily. 

“Card.” Dinah said before Helena could say cash, Helena didn’t have a credit card, Luca had always been vehemently against banks and the only reason Helena actually had a bank account was because her mother had added her to the family one when she was born, and she barely used anything besides cash. “Here.” 

The card Dinah fished out of her wallet was black and sleek and Helena watched as the woman squinted at the name embossed on the front before looking back up at Dinah. “Roman Sionis?”

“That’s me.” Dinah smiled, wide and pretty, and Helena turned her laugh into a cough. Of course. In the year since Cassandra had killed Sionis, no one had bothered to shut down any of his legal assets. The Black Mask Club had been taken over and most of everything had been redistributed to the other Gotham crime lords, but Sionis’ apartment lay vacant, since only Harley, Cassandra, Dinah, Renee, and Helena could actually verify his death, and his bank account and assets had apparently fallen into Dinah’s hands. 

Dinah paid, entering the pin number without hesitation, and Renee wandered back over as soon as the transaction had gone through. Naturally. Helena carried the bags, she was typically the designated pack mule when they had a lot of gear (Dinah and Renee claimed it was because she was the tallest and therefore had the most surface area on which to carry things) and she waited until she had put everything in the back of Renee’s truck to turn to Dinah. 

“You got his credit card?” 

“Yup. He left it in his car. I figure I have a year or two before his automatic payments stop and by then I’ll have perfect credit and can get my own. Wanna guess his pin?” 

“One two three four. Six nine six nine.” 

“Zsasz’s birthday. I swear those two were fucking, there was something going on there more than dudes being bros.” 

Renee snorted and Helena, having only seen Sionis and Zsasz interact once, was inclined to agree. She had only been face-to-face with Victor Zsasz twice, the first time was when he had opened fire on her family and the second time was when she had put an arrow through his neck, but she remembered the batshit look in his eye. It was permanently seared into her brain, the maniacal laughter and the scars pulling at his cheeks, the way his eyes were sunken into his face and the way he had cackled exactly the same way when he had slaughtered her family as when he had Harley tranquilized and a gun to Renee’s head. Like he had never seen anything so wonderful. 

“How much more shopping do we have to do today? It’s nighttime.” 

“Jesus Christ, it’s like three pm. The sun hasn’t even gone down.” 

“Fuck.” 

“Don’t complain. We’d have twice as much to do if you didn’t look incredible in everything you tried on.”

Helena muttered a word that would have made Luca smack her upside the head and tried to ignore the way Dinah’s words made her stomach twist, picking at the skin around her fingernails as Renee steered them down another fancy street. This neighbourhood was the same as the ones her mother had taken her to after school or when they had a free weekend, red bricks and clean glass and tidy rows of trees, men and women who had enough money to not worry about anything for the rest of their lives wandered hand-in-hand along the sidewalks, talking in cool, precise voices. 

_“This is where you belong, darling girl.” Maria says, Helena’s small hand in hers, as they walk down a street of pretty store windows and fancy cars. Late summer, Helena is about to start the second grade at Gotham Academy, and she clutches her mother’s hand like an anchor. The world is enormous and Helena is small and she hangs onto Maria’s every word as she always does. “Here. When you are older, you will come back here with your husband, and when you are older still, you will take your daughter here. The world will be yours, passerotta, and you must show the world your best.”_

_“I will, Mamma.” Helena follows her mother into one of the stores, still clinging tightly to her mother’s hand. The store is full of clothes like the ones her mother wears and the women in the store are all like her mother and they flock to her mother when they enter. Three ladies, all dressed in white sweaters and grey pants, all happy to see Maria._

_One of the women smiles at Helena, she has bright shiny teeth like pieces of gum Mamma forbids her to chew, and all the women seem to notice her at once, they smell like the sweet perfume that Helena isn’t allowed to play with and Helena is big and strong so she does not hide behind her mother’s leg like she so badly wants to do._

_“This is Helena, my oldest.” Maria says to the women, resting her hand on Helena’s shoulder proudly. Helena smiles at the women, good manners, and doesn’t look down at her shoes so her mother doesn’t squeeze her shoulder. “Say hello, passerotta.”_

_“Hello.” Helena tucks her hands behind her back and forces her chin up. The world will be hers, she thinks, and she must show the world her best. “It’s nice to meet you.”_

_“You too. Oh, she’s darling, Maria. You must be so proud.” One of the women says, offering Helena a pleasant smile. Her mother will be proud. She will be proud because Helena is lovely and polite and well-behaved and smart, because her mother has raised her very well._

_Maria runs a hand over Helena’s hair, she is proud of Helena and Helena swells with pride, she wonders if she will explode. Her mother is proud of her. “I am. She is the greatest thing that ever happened to me. Aside from Pino, of course.”_

_Helena might cry. She is the greatest thing that has ever happened to her mother, her mother’s pride and joy, and she-_

“Are you going deaf? I know we fire off a lot of guns, but you aren’t as old as Renee. You should be fine.” Dinah prodded Helena in the knee, startling her back into reality. They had parked and Renee was gone, maybe paying for parking, maybe not. Hard to tell with Renee. Dinah turned all the way around, craning her neck to look at Helena properly, and her eyes were dark and wide and they studied Helena’s face like she was an unsolvable puzzle. 

“No. I’m good.” Helena shook the memory out of her head, hard, this was too much reminiscing in one day for her liking, and ran a hand over her face. “Hey, uh, thanks for the clothes.” 

“I didn’t buy them.” Dinah shrugged, one side of her jacket sliding off her shoulders. The skin underneath was smooth, clean, and Helena knew it would be way too much to fix it and she refused to even entertain the thought. “That fucker Sionis did.” 

“Still. No one does stuff like that for me. So thanks.” Helena smiled, a real smile, maybe it was because of the thought of her mother and maybe it was the way Dinah was looking at her with those sharp brown eyes, but it was a genuine smile, her first in a long time. And smiling at Dinah didn’t feel so bad. She liked smiling at Dinah, if only for the way that Dinah’s entire face lit up at the sight, the way her stomach burst into sunshine when Dinah looked at her, and decided that she’d need to start smiling more. Just for that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> more cute shopping scenes will come.


	4. iv: in which there is some homoerotic eye contact

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> helena doesn't know how to act, ever.

Though Helena would sooner die than admit it, Dinah was right. It felt nice to wear clothes that weren’t bleak and that fit her properly, she liked how the colours looked against her skin and how she felt marginally more confident in the shirts and pants Dinah had picked out for her. What she liked most of all was the way every time she wore a new outfit Dinah wolf-whistled and Renee told her she looked decent. It was high praise from Renee, who very rarely complimented anyone besides Ellen or Cassandra, and Helena would take what she could get. 

She wasn’t wearing her new clothes now, though. Now, Helena wore a black and blue bomber and black pants shoved into black boots, her mask secured on her face and her hair slicked back. She was crouched behind several crates in a warehouse, her crossbow slung over one shoulder and a gun at her hip. It was very cold and very dark and Helena was fairly cranky, mostly because Great White was late. 

According to Renee, the arms deal was scheduled for midnight in this stupid fucking abandoned warehouse, where every illicit meeting seemed to take place in Gotham, but according to the time blinking on the inside of Helena’s arm, it was twelve twenty-seven and Great White was nowhere to be found. The six men toting several massive boxes of what should be Russian firearms were there, standing around and chatting back and forth in very rapid Russian, Helena and Renee and Dinah were there, Dinah was behind a pile of crates across the room from Helena and Renee was by the door, but Great White and his entourage were not there. 

Helena’s Russian was mediocre at best, she understood maybe every fourth word, and the Russians were starting to get angry as well. Good. Helena was pretty pissed, though the fact that she was angry at a gangster for being late instead of for, you know, being a gangster, was pretty stupid and pretty on-brand for her. She couldn’t see Renee or Dinah, but Renee fucking abhored waiting, so she was sure Renee was in a horrible mood. That meant she might hit to kill, not to injure, which was never a good thing. 

“ _Ten_.” One of the men said, he said more but Helena couldn’t actually make out what the words were, and another nodded his assent. Ten what? Ten minutes? Ten hours? Ten guns? Fuck, Helena wished Luca had cared more about teaching her Slavic languages. He thought they were dumb and so she had passing knowledge of Russian, Polish, and Ukranian and not much more. “Keep white up.”

If Helena had to guess, she’d say that they were willing to wait ten more minutes and would be keeping the weapons if Great White didn’t show up in time. That seemed entirely reasonable, if Helena was being honest, but she had a feeling Dinah and Renee wouldn’t agree and would probably make her go in for the kill or something. Helena unslung her crossbow and loaded it neatly, bracing the weapon on her forearm. She could put an arrow through the biggest Russian’s eye before he could blink, she could line it up just right and kill two at once, she could just off them and be done with it, but Renee would be mad and Dinah would be disappointed and she hated disappointing Dinah. 

At exactly twelve-thirty, footsteps began to echo through the warehouse. Mobsters were nothing if not dramatic. Helena levelled her crossbow as three people came into view; two bulky men with sharks tattooed on their shaved heads and a taller man Helena knew had to be Great White. She had never met the man, but Dinah had told her horror stories about him. He was supposed to be one of the worst men in Gotham, stealing hundreds of millions from its citizens, and he was fucking hideous. He had no nose, lips, eyebrows, or ears, his teeth were filed into sharp points and there were three lines carved into either side of his neck like gills. Helena nearly shuddered, his skin glowed white and he wore a long black coat that made him look like a weird, disfigured ghost. 

“You’re late.” The leader of the Russians barked, his accent so thick Helena barely realized he was speaking English, and Great White ignored him, gesturing to his two mercenaries. Helena leaned forwards, her finger taut on the trigger of her bow, and watched as the two hulking men opened the first box. “You got our money?” 

“Of course.” Great White removed an envelope from his jacket, Helena was genuinely surprised it wasn’t a briefcase full of ones, and set it down on the floor in front of him. He took a step back and Helena’s finger twitched, it would be nothing to send an arrow into his skull, but no one had signalled to her, so she wouldn’t. She peered out from the crates to meet Dinah’s eye. Dinah wore her suit, her hair tied into a tight bun, and she nodded. 

Helena jammed her fingers in her ears and ducked her head. Dinah’s scream was still loud enough to hurt but if she covered her ears, her brain wouldn’t start bleeding. The crates exploded in a shower of splinters, every single one of the gangsters crumpled, and Helena watched Dinah as that supersonic shriek tore through the warehouse. She was the most powerful person Helena had ever seen, ferocious and beautiful and strong, and Helena could have watched her scream forever. Well, she couldn’t, because her brain might start leaking out of her skull, but her point remained. 

Dinah cut off her scream and punched the nearest man in the face, and while it wasn’t a cue, it was the closest one Helena was going to get, so she fired her crossbow and watched the arrow bury itself between the shoulder blades of the biggest Russian. She shouldn’t be using her crossbow in this range, Helena’s aim was flawless but sawdust and close range meant she might misfire and lodge an arrow in Renee’s head. 

Fists worked too, and when the first gangster came at her Helena used the iron plates on her knuckles to knock as many teeth as she could out of his mouth. She hit him until his forehead caved in and then a little bit more, until he lay still and bleeding on the ground, and then she kicked him once more. For luck. Renee and Dinah called her ruthless, but she didn’t think so. Luca and Sal and Massimo had taught her to beat someone bloody and then hit them more, because they owe you nothing.

The second gangster was bigger, he got in a single punch that sent Helena reeling, and the man laughed. He fucking laughed at her. “Pathetic little girl. What can your weak fists do to stop me?”

Helena was not weak. She was Huntress, vigilante and Bird of Prey, and she was so fucking strong. She was strong and powerful and she was stronger than her mother and she was stronger than her father and she slammed her fist into the side of the man’s jaw, bone crunching beneath her hand as the man screamed. Fuck him. Fuck him for thinking she was weak and fuck him for calling her pathetic and fuck him because she was not a little girl. 

She punched the shit out of him until he sagged to the ground, and when he fell Helena kicked him, again and again and again, because she was not weak. _You do not leave people alive, piccola morte. It is a weakness. Are you weak?_ Luca asked her when she pulled her punches, when she refused to break Massimo’s jaw. He provoked her, called her weak, and Helena wasn’t. Fucking. Weak. 

Well, she wasn’t until someone stabbed her in the stomach. While it wasn’t exactly a weakness, it did hurt like a motherfucking bitch. Helena looked up at the man who had stabbed her, gaping at the goddamn audacity of some people, and he yanked the knife out and was making to stab her again when she pulled her gun and shot him point-blank in the head. Brain and blood and bone splattered her, but she was already bleeding, and Helena was fucking strong. She pistol-whipped the next man and the pain was awful, blinding, it was one of the worst things she’d ever felt in her life, but she was fucking strong. 

Helena ignored the wound in her stomach. A bad idea, to be sure, and she regretted it as soon as she turned an inch to the left and felt her blood spill down her side. Renee fell into step beside her, her brass knuckles glinting and her lip split, and Helena watched her shatter one of the last men’s ribs (Renee said it was because the ribs hurt more, but Renee couldn’t reach anyone’s face and Helena knew it). God, her stomach hurt. She could feel blood spreading across her jacket, she pressed one hand to the hole and willed the blood to stop, but Helena had to be strong. She had to. 

“Great White got away.” Renee said, panting as she watched the last man fall to Dinah’s patented kidney kick, and Helena blinked. How the fuck had she missed so much of this fight? Probably the stab wound, but Helena was normally more observant than that, stabbed or not. “Ran home as soon as Dinah started screaming.” 

“Damn.” Helena took a deep breath, she knew you were supposed to press your hand to wounds so she didn’t bleed out but god it fucking burned , and dropped her gun. Fuck. It clattered against the stone floor, so loud it made Helena flinch, spinning across the floor to land just beside Dinah’s boots. 

Helena swallowed hard. Luca had prepared her for this, had taught her how to grit your teeth and smile through the pain, but he had never stabbed her and told her to suck it up. He might have if Massimo and Sal had let him (and thank God they hadn’t), and God, was she going to die? 

“Everybody good?” Dinah’s nose was bleeding and she wiped it on the back of her hand as she joined them, leaving a thin streak of red down her lip. Helena wondered why she found it endearing and wondered even more why she wanted to wash it away, but she had also been fucking stabbed, so she forced it to the back of her mind and looked up at Dinah. “Oh, Jesus fucking Christ, Helena.” 

Dinah caught Helena as she fell and Helena didn’t want to die in Dinah’s arms. That would be way too dramatic. Renee cursed, loudly and violently, as she saw the hole in Helena’s stomach, and Helena shut her eyes so she didn’t have to look at their faces when they saw her weakened. She didn’t want them to see her weak, and collapsing like a sickly Victorian child was fairly weak. 

“You aren’t allowed to die on me, Helena. You hear me?” Dinah’s arms were strong and warm and Helena sagged into them, blood running down her side and probably onto Dinah’s skin. Was she bleeding on Dinah? Gross. “I won’t let you die on me. Okay?”

“She needs to go to a hospital.” Renee said, but her voice sounded very very far away and Helena’s stomach hurt and oh God, she really didn’t want to die in Dinah’s arms. “She needs a fucking doctor.” 

“No.” Helena hated hospitals. She hated how they smelled and she hated how they were full of sick people and she would not be one of those sick people. “Gross. No hospitals.” 

“Uh, there’s a fucking hole in your stomach. You don’t get to make those decisions.”

Helena opened one eye, met Renee’s gaze, and frowned. “No hospitals. I hate them.” 

“How are you still fucking talking? We have to go to the hospital or you’re going to die. I’m not letting you die because you hate hospitals.” 

“My mom used to get me to stitch her up.” That was Dinah, still holding Helena in her arms, and Renee made a very disgruntled noise. “I have the supplies, I can do it.” 

“Are you fucking kidding me? You want to stitch her up at home?” 

“I don’t **want** to. But Helena, if you hate hospitals that much-”

Helena nodded and immediately knew she had fucked up when more blood began to drip down her side. Everything hurt and she didn’t want to die a virgin, let alone nearly twenty-five without her first kiss, and Helena shut her eyes again and prayed to _il signore nostro Dio_ that she would open them again. 

She didn’t pass out, she didn’t think, but Helena couldn’t tell you how Renee and Dinah managed to drag her ass all the way back to Dinah’s apartment. She remembered a lot of cursing (Renee) and a lot of reassurance (Dinah) and she woke up properly when Renee smacked her head into Dinah’s doorframe. Which, ouch. She felt jostled and everything hurt and the light was so bright. 

“On the table.” Dinah’s voice, it was her commanding voice when she meant business, and Helena bit out a word Luca never let her say as she was dropped fairly roughly onto Dinah’s kitchen table. She groaned, squeezing her eyes shut tight, and all she could hear was Dinah’s bossy voice directing Renee around the apartment and her own blood pounding in her ears. She felt someone, probably Dinah because Renee wasn’t very gentle, unzip her jacket and take it off. Her skin felt cold except around her stomach where she was burning hot and Helena flinched when her shirt was pulled up over the wound. 

Oh, Dinah was going to have to touch her skin to stitch her up. Would death or hands on her stomach hurt more? Death, probably, but fucking hell she did not want anyone to touch her. She didn’t like being touched, even with a fucking hole in her gut, and she especially didn’t want the first time Dinah touched her beyond her hands to be literally sewing her stomach closed. Helena forced herself to open her eyes, staring up at the dangling light above her head. If she let herself fall asleep, she might die, and she couldn’t die yet. 

“Can you sit up on your elbows?” Dinah asked, she was drying her hands with a towel while Renee leaned over Helena’s stomach. Helena bit down on her lip, braced herself, and did what Dinah told her to do. “Look at me, okay? Look at me.” 

Helena did. Dinah’s eyes were dark and hard, she looked anxious and afraid and there was still a streak of blood on her top lip, but she looked at Helena with dark hard eyes and Helena knew that she wouldn’t die. How could she when Dinah’s hands were steady on her stomach, when Dinah was looking at her with those eyes? 

“This is going to hurt. I need you to look at me and I need you to stay still, no matter what. You’ll be okay. I promise. You need to stay conscious.” Dinah poured something onto some cloth and Helena watched her wipe the bloody hole with whatever that was. From here, it didn’t look too bad, more of a slit than an actual hole, but it fucking hurt and Helena had to bite down on her knuckles so she didn’t scream. If Dinah’s neighbours heard shrieking in the middle of the night, it would probably end up in a call to Gotham PD, and none of them had time to explain to Renee’s incompetent former colleagues that Helena had been stabbed and refused to go to a hospital. 

“Helena, how old are you?” Dinah asked, tying the black thread on the needle and looking up at Helena. What did that have to do with the fucking hole in her stomach? 

“What?” Renee, who was standing beside Dinah holding a wad of gauze and a bottle of what might have been rubbing alcohol, she wasn’t drinking it but she looked pretty close, frowned at Dinah. 

“Shut up. How old are you?” Dinah didn’t take her eyes off Helena, she lifted one eyebrow and tilted her head. Oh. Luca had taught her this trick, it was supposed to distract you from pain, but he had made her do things like unload and reload her crossbow fifty times or recite the names of every Italian president in order of Luca’s dislike for them. 

“Twenty-four.” Helena winced when she felt the needle dig into her stomach, fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck, but Dinah rested her other hand on Helena’s arm, gently, and every other feeling in Helena’s body faded except for the warmth of Dinah’s fingers and the way she was looking at Helena reassuringly. 

“When are you going to be twenty-five?” 

“February fourteenth.” 

“I didn’t know you were born on Valentine’s.”

“Yeah, I, uh, don’t really like my birthday, so I don’t celebrate it.” 

“Well, now I know when to get you a present.” 

Helena grit her teeth, mostly because the idea of present-giving was foriegn and absurd and unpleasant, and Dinah laughed as she pulled her stitch tighter and tied it off. “What were your parents’ names?” 

“Maria and Franco Bertinelli.”

“What did you call them when you were little?” 

“Mamma and babbo. My brother couldn’t say them, though, he called them ma and bab.”

“You had a brother?” Dinah’s voice was quiet and firm, she looked up at Helena and her eyes were sharp, inquisitive, she was holding Helena’s gaze without really trying and Helena could have drowned in those eyes, in that soft smile. “I didn’t know that either. Younger or older?” 

“Younger. Giuseppe Lorenzo Bertinelli. We called him Pino, though.” 

“So you’re like, really really Italian, huh? Can I guess your middle name? Is it Francesca? No, wait, Giovanna.”

“No. Solid guess, though.” Helena forced herself not to laugh, because if she did she might mess up Dinah’s stitches, and settled for a half-smile. “It’s Rosa.” 

“Helena Rosa Bertinelli.” Helena’s name had never sounded better than when it came from Dinah’s lips, she said Helena’s name like a prayer, like a song, and if she had gone deaf at that very moment she wouldn’t have minded as long as she could keep the memory of Dinah saying her name. “Pretty. Know what mine is?” 

“Uh, Elizabeth. Star. Storm. Anne. Bird. Peacock. Steven.” 

“Nah. Laurel. My mom’s name.” 

“Dinah Laurel Lance. I like that. Very superhero-y.” 

“Mine is Maria, in case anyone was wondering.” Renee grumbled, crossing her arms over her chest and eyeing the rubbing alcohol. She ignored the looks from both Dinah and Helena, leaned back against Dinah’s counter, and scowled. “What? I thought we were sharing.”

“You speak Italian, right?” Dinah steadily refused to acknowledge Renee, tying another small knot in the thread. Three thin stitches were in Helena’s stomach now, tight and neat, and Helena had just barely felt them. Huh. Maybe that was the point of the questions. 

“Sicilian.” 

“Isn’t that the same thing?” 

“No. It’s like Spanish and Porteguese. Similar, but not the same.” 

“Fancy. So English is your second language?” 

“Kinda. I’m fluent in both, but a little better with Sicilian. I spoke it more growing up.” 

“That’s dope. Will you teach me some?”

“Uh, maybe not right this second.” Helena winced when she felt another stitch, god it fucking hurt, and Dinah ran one thumb over Helena’s arm gently, soothingly, Her hand was warm and Helena was cold and it was so fucking nice to be touched. Which was weird, because Helena hated being touched most of the time. “But yeah. If you want.” 

“Cool. Renee, don’t you dare drink that.” Dinah didn’t look up at Renee, who lowered the rubbing alcohol from her mouth guiltily and set it down on the counter. “It’s expired and also don’t be a fucking idiot. You’ll fucking die.” 

“I have a liver of steel. I might just get a little sick.” 

“I don’t think high-functioning alcoholism means you can drink rubbing alcohol, Renee.” Helena frowned as her skin was pulled together, (Dinah had to be done soon, right?) and leaned back onto her elbows, groaning. Renee tossed a bandage in her general direction and opened Dinah’s fridge, which was empty except for a stack of old plastic takeout containers, a carton of eggs, and a single onion. 

“You have no food.” 

“Yeah, I know. I have to go grocery shopping tomorrow.”

“Well, I’m fucking hungry. If I’m not back in twenty minutes, I’m dead.” Renee shrugged her jacket on and took Dinah’s keys as she left, slamming the door behind her. Fucking Renee. Helena was very rarely alone with Dinah, mostly because Dinah made her so nervous it gave her a stomachache, and twice in one week? Helena might really throw up. 

Dinah was looking at Helena now, half a smile on her lips, so faint Helena wondered if Dinah knew she was doing it, and god, she would kill a thousand men for Dinah’s smile. A million men. She would drag the moon from the sky if Dinah would smile like that again. 

Was this what friendship was? Helena had never really had friends before. Even as a child, she had been shy and awkward and as an adult she had no idea how to talk to people. Now she had four friends, Dinah and Renee and Cassandra and Harley, which was four more than she had ever had before, and sometimes she still didn’t know how to talk to them. She cared about them, probably, if this was what caring for a person was, and Helena didn’t hate it. Well, mostly didn’t hate it. 

“All done.” Dinah tied off the last knot and Helena looked down at her stomach, where seven neat lines of black thread ran along the gash near her belly button. She had felt maybe three of them, the rest had been eclipsed by the feeling of Dinah’s hand on her arm, and they looked pretty sick, if Helena was being honest. Like _il armali a cùsiri_ , the scary man in that story Luca liked. 

“I look like the monster.” Helena said, hoping to god Dinah knew who she was talking about. Dinah frowned, her eyebrows pulling together, and then her entire face relaxed and she laughed, taping a square of gauze over the stitches carefully. 

“Yeah, it is kinda like Frankenstien. It’s gonna scar, though. It might not have if you went to a fucking hospital, but…” Dinah trailed off, wiping her hands on her pants and walking over to the sink. Fuck hospitals. She didn’t like them and she never would and it didn’t matter, really, Helena had a few little scars. What was one more? 

“Who cares. Scars are cool.” Helena sat up, swore as a fresh spear of pain shot through her stomach, and was about to tug her shirt down when she realized it was sweaty and covered in blood. Fuck. It was pulled up just below her bra, barely covering the tattoo on her ribcage, but she really didn’t want to smear more blood on her skin. 

“Scars are very cool and very sexy.” Dinah turned around, flicking water off her hands, and her gaze lingered for less than a second on Helena’s stomach before darting back up to her face. “Here, hold on.” 

Dinah vanished into her bedroom for a moment, leaving the door open, and Helena caught a glimpse of a big bed piled with blankets and a heap of clothes on a chair before Dinah returned, a pink top dangling from her hand. Oh. Nice of her, though Helena was taller and flatter than Dinah and it probably wouldn’t fit, and it was also pink, and Helena took the clean tank top. 

“Thanks.” Helena turned around, Jesus she was getting undressed in front of Dinah a lot, and wriggled out of her dirty shirt before yanking on Dinah’s clean one. It didn’t fit, the hem barely reached halfway down her stomach and she didn’t fill out the chest even a little, but it was clean and it smelled like Dinah, like lavender and lemon and salt and Helena wanted to be buried in it. 

When Helena turned around, Dinah had very studiously cut her gaze in a way that made Helena think that maybe she had been watching Helena’s back, but that would have been stupid, so she dismissed the thought and wiped some dried blood off her pants. Her pants weren’t as dirty as her shirt had been and she couldn’t wear Dinah’s pants for many reasons, so she wiped a bit more blood off. 

“Don’t strain yourself for the next couple days, alright? No running, no gymnastics, none of that shit. I don’t need you busting your stitches because you decided to start doing flips.” Dinah flung herself onto the couch and yanked off one of her boots, tossing it across the apartment and doing the same to the other. Helena joined her on the couch, albeit very gingerly, and Dinah shifted over so they were closer and propped her elbow on the back of the couch. 

Helena watched her rummage around in the couch cushions until she produced a cigarette triumphantly, sticking it between her teeth and pulling a lighter from her pocket. Dinah didn’t smoke often, or so she claimed, and normally only when she was stressed, and it took her three tries to actually get it to light. 

“Sorry. Calms my nerves.” Dinah said, leaning over to tap the ash into a swan-shaped ashtray. It was cute, silver, and when Dinah offered Helena the cigarette she took it. Helena didn’t smoke, ever, Luca had told her it was a nasty habit for nasty people and flicked her in the forehead when she asked him why he did it, but there was a thin line of lipgloss around the filter and Helena took a careful drag. 

She immediately started wheezing, coughing so hard the stitches in her stomach hurt, and swore violently, handing the cigarette back as Dinah laughed, the most beautiful sound Helena had ever heard, and flicked the ash off the end. Jesus Christ, this was why she didn’t smoke, because one single puff and she was ready to hack up a lung. 

“It’s a terrible habit. Don’t pick it up.” Dinah said, blowing a smoke ring at the ceiling. The smell would have been worse if every window wasn’t wide open, which seemed fairly dangerous considering Dinah lived on the second floor and not in a great neighbourhood, but Helena never shut her windows, so she shouldn’t judge. “God, I’m tired. Are you tired?” 

“I’m fucking exhausted.” Helena admitted, watching Dinah exhale another curl of smoke. It was true, adrenaline or emotions or the feeling of warm fingers on her arm had kept her going this long but she could feel it now, bone-deep, as if she hadn’t slept in days. Helena slept eight hours a night, no more and no less, and it was like one-thirty in the morning and she was so fucking tired. 

“Bed or couch?” Dinah ground out her cigarette and looked at Helena, yawning without bothering to cover her mouth. Helena’s stomach clenched. She didn’t sleep anywhere but her own bed. Never. It was a very strict rule she had, but she didn’t really feel like walking home by herself and waking up by herself and Dinah’s couch was very comfortable and Dinah’s eyes were very warm.

“Couch.” Helena kicked her shoes off and lay down, trying very hard to be casual as Dinah pulled a blanket out from underneath the coffee table and flicked it out on top of Helena. It was a soft blanket and Dinah made sure it was tucked in properly before she herself settled back on the couch and oh, shit, Dinah was going to sleep on the couch too. What if she saw Helena drool in her sleep or something? Helena didn’t know if she drooled or snored or did stupid shit in her sleep and she didn’t want Dinah to see her do any stupid shit. Ever. 

“ _Bona notti_.” Helena murmured, it was what her mother always said to her before bed, and Helena could have sworn Dinah smiled a very big smile as she turned out the light.


	5. v: does helena have friends? (part 1)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cassandra Cain and her four moms are living their best lives.

As it turned out, Helena hated sitting still. It wasn’t really a surprise, Helena had always loved to move, when she was young she had danced in her bedroom and played games with her brother when their parents weren’t home. When she got older, she fought, she trained, she ran laps of Luca’s property until her lungs felt like they were going to explode. Even now, in Gotham, she did one hundred sit-ups, one hundred push-ups, and one hundred pull-ups every day and ran when she had the time. 

But she was getting antsy. A week since her stomach had been stitched closed and she was antsy, restless, it turned out Helena didn’t actually have any hobbies aside from punching things and shooting people and she was so fucking bored. Dinah had told her to wait at least two weeks before returning to her usual routine of kicking and punching and running and Helena thought if she had to pace for another week she might fucking explode. 

“Can you sit down? You’re making me nervous.” Renee looked up from her show and narrowed her eyes at Helena, doing her very best intimidating face. It didn’t work, mostly because being bossed around by Renee was like being bossed around by a small angry cat, and Helena returned to the track she was wearing into Dinah’s floorboards. 

It was a nice night, all things considered. Dinah and Renee were settled on Dinah’s couch, Renee was drinking a rum and coke minus the coke and focusing very intently on whatever show they were watching, Dinah was drawing something in a sketchbook and letting Renee drink all her rum, and Helena was pacing behind them and picking at her fingernails so she didn’t pick at her stitches. The remains of a pizza lay on the coffee table, it was crust and grease and a few stray pepperonis, and Helena’s dinner (she had managed half a slice before giving up on the American bullshit and eating two oranges) sat heavy in her stomach. 

“Helena, do you want a drink? A smoke? Some weed? Renee’s phasing from happy drunk to angry drunk and she might snap your neck if you don’t sit down.” Dinah drew another sweeping line on the page, Helena couldn’t make out what she was drawing but her eyebrows were doing that thing they did when she was focused so it had to be important. 

“She can’t reach my neck.” Helena turned on her heel and began another lap of Dinah’s living room, scraping at her cuticles in a futile attempt to distract herself from the fucking itch of those seven fucking lines of black fucking thread on her stomach. She had never had a wound that actually needed stitches before, Luca had made sure of that, and Jesus Christ the itch was fucking unbearable. 

“Oh, you say that again, you stupid-ass crossbow motherfuc-”

Before Renee could finish her rum-induced insult, Dinah’s door slammed open so hard the pictures rattled on the wall and Harley fucking Quinn appeared in a puff of glitter like the worst birthday clown ever. Fucking hell. Helena wasn’t entirely sure what Harley’s deal was, she knew Harley was absolutely batshit and that she had a habit of beating the shit out of men who stepped within twenty feet of her, she knew Harley had stolen Dinah’s car and pawned the Bertinelli diamond after stealing it from Helena, but that was about it. And now she was here, appearing out of the blue (as she did about once a month, no matter how insane and erratic Harley pretended to be she still came to visit fairly often) to bother them before leaving again. 

“Howdy, ladies!” Harley dropped a fistful of receipts and foil wrappers on Dinah’s kitchen table and motioned to Cassandra to close the door. Cass, now nearly fifteen, locked it behind her before running over and wrapping her arms around Dinah. Though if asked Cass would call them all stupid and overprotective, she hugged Dinah and Renee in turn and let Renee press a soft kiss to the top of her head. Cass was taller than Renee now, if only by a few inches, and she looked so fucking pleased with herself that Helena smiled, pausing in her tracks to wrap Cass in a tight hug. 

“Hey, kid. You keeping Harley in check?” Helena had hugged exactly one person in the past sixteen years, she really thought that the idea of just holding a person with her arms seemed stupid as hell, but Cass gave good hugs and she was a good kid and if she was going to hug a person, Cass may as well be that person. 

“Always. You still on that fucking bow and arrow shit?” Cass hopped up on the back of Dinah’s couch and kicked her legs, the glitter on her eyelids sparkling in the light from the TV. As always, she and Harley were wearing tastefully matching outfits, bedazzled denim jackets in different patterns and striped pants, Harley had added to the tattoos on her face with a diamond just in front of her ear and her fingernails were painted with tiny lightning bolts. Cass’ nails matched, but thank god Harley hadn’t let her get any tattoos yet. Well, any that Renee and Helena and Dinah knew about, anyways, and hopefully it stayed that way. 

“You know it.” Helena let Harley give her a wet kiss on the cheek, Harley spent her life leaving bright red glittery lipstick on Helena’s cheeks, and batted Harley’s hand away when she tried to pull up Helena’s shirt. “Harley. We talked about this.” 

“Well, it’s not my fault I want to see your sexy new stab wound! Let me see!” Harley grinned, making another attempt to lift up Helena’s shirt, and Helena smacked the back of her wrist and clicked her tongue like you would to a stray animal. How the fuck did Harley know she got stabbed? Harley barely knew her last name unless Cass reminded her and even then it was fifty-fifty. 

“Snitch! You said you wouldn’t tell!” Dinah elbowed Cass in the ribs and pried the glass bottle out of her hands, Cass had been trying very unsubtly to add rum to the can of coke Renee had given her. Right. Dinah and Cass texted a decent amount, mostly stupid tweets or pictures of Bruce or the occasional photo of Renee asleep in weird positions with her mouth hanging open, and it must have come up in conversation. Probably. 

“It’s not my fault she goes through my phone.” Cass grumbled, leaning into Dinah’s side and propping her feet on the empty pizza box. Dinah slung her arm around Cass’ shoulders, ruffling her hair indulgently, and set down her sketchbook. “Can we see, Helena? Stab wounds are cool.” 

“You’d think.” Helena sighed, but lifted the hem of her shirt so Harley and Cass could see the stitches along her side. Harley immediately went to touch them, but her nails were long and there was glitter and ink smeared on her fingertips and if Helena got a fucking infection because Harley was incapable of keeping her hands to herself, she would be fucking pissed. “Hands off. It’s still healing.” 

“Gross.” Cass said cheerfully, admiring the pucked red skin as Helena snatched Harley’s hand out of the air for the fourth time. Harley made a face and squirmed out of her jacket, six or seven random bags were slung along her chest and stomach, all of them pink and all of them partially open. She took them all off, dropping them one by one onto Dinah’s floor, and Helena could have sworn she heard the tinkling of breaking glass more than once. Underneath, Harley wore a bright yellow sports bra that hid so little Helena wondered if she needed to avert her eyes. Jesus, there was a kid here. 

Helena resumed her pacing and Harley poured a good amount of rum into one of the glasses on Dinah’s table (Helena thought it might be hers but she wasn’t using it). She knocked back most of the glass in one go and dumped more into her glass before throwing an arm over both Dinah and Renee and grinning her maniac grin. 

“What are we doing tonight?” Harley, who had never once spoken below a grating screech, asked, taking another massive sip of her drink. Renee scowled, she had a grudging respect for Harley but interrupting her TV show was something even Ellen rarely did, and hit pause. “Oh, come on! Let’s do something fun! I missed you guys!” 

“I bet.” Renee muttered, letting Harley squeeze her shoulder and tug at the collar of her shirt. Helena peeled a bit of skin off her cuticle absently, god she wanted to run or jump around or hit something or do a push-up or something to keep herself from losing her mind, and tuned them all out neatly so she could sort out her thoughts for a minute or two. 

Helena needed to pick up a hobby. It was super unhealthy to have no pastimes at the tender age of twenty-four; Dinah drew and sang and shopped and painted and read, Renee drank and smoked and argued with Ellen and fixed things and drank more, even fucking Harley had hobbies (though Helena didn’t need to start tattooing herself or take up making her own very tacky clothes) and Helena had none. None at all. She had no artistic talent (the picture nine year-old Helena had drawn of the men who had killed her family remained her singular masterpiece), she had once put a nail through her own toe trying to build a shelf, her knowledge of English syntax wasn’t enough for her to properly appreciate reading and there were no modern novels written in Sicilian, and everything else she had tried had failed. 

What else could she do? Her singing sounded like a kitten being put into a blender, she didn’t have the patience for jigsaw puzzles or knitting or any old-person bullshit like that, all she really did was exercise and shoot things and ride her motorcycle and take naps. Maybe she needed to start cooking, but the problem with cooking was that Helena didn’t actually enjoy eating beyond what was necessary to survive, Luca had always told her that food was fuel and nothing more (especially American food, which Luca hated almost as much as he hated the seventh president of Italy), so cooking would probably be wasted on her, she could cook several basic dishes and that was it. She had played piano when she was young, but she had fucking hated it, so she couldn’t do that. 

“Helena?” Cass’ voice cut through her thoughts and Helena blinked hard, once, before raising an eyebrow at Cass. Cass had tried and failed to worm her way out of Dinah’s death grip, but Dinah was unrelenting, and she was looking up at Helena with her sad puppy eyes that meant she wanted to pull some stupid shit. “Can we go for a ride?” 

Of course. Cass loved driving around Gotham on the back of Helena’s motorcycle, she had only started about six months ago because Helena refused to break the law when it came to Cass’ safety and now every single time Harley came around, Helena and Cass rode around and shot the shit and enjoyed each other’s company. It was like having a kid except when Cass called her dumb and she got to return the kid to Harley at the end of the day. 

“Depends. Have you been drinking?” Helena was already pulling her jacket on, she almost never said no to Cass (in fact, she had only told her no twice: once when Cass asked if she could drive the motorcycle and once when Cass had picked up one of Helena’s knives and tried to chuck it across the room) and she especially didn’t say no to Cass when she had already wanted to go out for a drive. “You know the rules.” 

“Yeah, yeah. Let’s go, grandma.” Cass waved her off and finally extracted herself from Dinah’s arms, making Dinah pout. God, the four of them fucking doted on this kid. It was a little ridiculous, honestly, she got all the clothes and snacks and attention she wanted and once she turned eighteen she had around seventy-five million dollars in the bank just waiting for her to spend (that was actually all Helena, Renee thought that leaving an eighteen year-old a fortune was insane and Dinah had suggested Helena donate some of it, but Helena wanted Cass to have the best possible life she could). All of them would die for her, they had all almost died for her several times, and there was very little Helena wouldn’t do to keep Cass safe. 

Cass had brought her own motorcycle helmet with her, bright pink and painted with glittery orange flames, and Helena pulled her own over her head. Much to Harley’s chagrin, Helena’s helmet was not hot pink with glitter flames, it was sleek and black with a tiny purple arrow painted on either side, the only modifications she had made and the only ones she wanted. Honestly, the little arrows looked pretty cool, and she had been debating getting them tattooed on her for a while. 

“Do your signals.” Helena slipped her visor down while Cass clambered onto the back of the bike, when they were both sitting on the seat Helena couldn’t see Cass but she trusted that her helmet was on and buckled. She heard Cass groan before a set of wiry little arms slipped around Helena’s waist and held firm. “Stop?” 

Cass tapped once on Helena’s stomach, just below her stitches, but beneath a shirt and a thick motorcycle jacket it felt fine, and Helena nodded. “Good. Slow down?”   
Two taps. _Pull over_ was three, _Do a trick_ was four, and Cass just yelled in her ear if she had another problem. Helena got worried sometimes, she didn’t like the idea of Cass being uncomfortable or afraid and then not doing anything about it, so she made Cass repeat her signals every single time they went for a ride. Safety first or whatever. 

“Alright. You have a place in mind or you just want to ride?” Helena flexed her fingers, Cass’ arms tight around her midsection, and smiled. She fucking loved her motorcycle. Maybe that could be her hobby. Motorcycles. Were motorcycles a hobby? She might have to ask Renee and Dinah, but that could be fun. 

“Anywhere you want to go.” Cass said over the roar of the engine and Helena grinned again. Cass’ wish was her command. It always was. Helena rolled the throttle, felt the bike purr underneath her, and then they were off, rumbling down the street in the general direction of Gotham River. 

Helena could do fucking anything on her bike. It was fairly new, the bike she had crashed while helping Harley kill Sionis was broken beyond repair, but she had been due for an upgrade anyways and her new bike, a masterpiece of black and chrome, was perfect. It rode like a dream and every piece from the clutch to the footpegs to the tires was in flawless condition, as if it was brand new but had been worn in just for her needs. 

It had been Massimo who had taught her how to ride a motorcycle, he had three bikes and treated them like his children, and he had started taking her along the coast when she was twelve. Massimo, Sal’s brother and Luca’s younger son, talked very little but cared for Helena and Sal and Luca very much, he had let Helena beat the shit out of him day after day after day without a single complaint and taught her how to ride a motorcycle, how to dip the ends of Luca’s cigarettes in water so they wouldn’t light and he’d start shrieking, how to aim for the neck instead of the chest for a more painful kill. 

_“Clutch.” Massimo says, his hands braced on the handlebars of the motorcycle. Helena, freshly sixteen and just finishing up puberty, straddles the bike with her toes on the ground and presses on the clutch lightly. She is tall, taller than Luca now, with too-long limbs and acne on her forehead and small boobs she doesn’t know what to do with, and Massimo has finally been allowed to teach her how to ride one of his bikes. “Good. Front brakes?”_

_Helena pulls on the front brakes, the motorcycle isn’t running but Massimo is making her go through the controls again and again until they’re second nature. Smart and also painfully boring and she pushes the front of Massimo’s helmet up, it’s a bit too big and the visor blocks bits of her vision, frowning. “This is dumb. Can’t I just drive this old thing already?”_

_“No, mio piccola vespa.” My little wasp. Helena is always their little something, she is Luca’s little killer and Massi’s little wasp and Sal’s little wolf, no matter how tall she gets or how many times she beats Massi and Sal in fights. “An old thing? This bike is older than you, Helena, and you must respect your elders.”_

_“I know it’s older than me.” Helena says, she has to hold the visor up so it doesn’t fall back down over her eyes, and Massi smiles, the thick scar down the left side of his face twisting. He has never told Helena how he got the scar, she asks him at least once a week and he always says he’ll tell her when she’s older, and Sal’s answer for how his brother got the scar ranges from a shark attack to a knife fight to a freak accident with a blender. “It runs like it.”_

_“So rude, piccola vespa. Throttle.” Massi holds her visor up with a finger, still smiling, his sharp black eyes locked on hers. Helena frowns and twists the throttle, hard, if the engine was on she would have run him down, but instead Massi shakes his head, the diamond stud in his ear glinting in the light. “Nicely, Helena. Your bike is your friend. Treat it well and it will treat you well. Treat it poorly and you will end up painted on these roads. You hear me? Now shift gears. Nicely.”_

Cass’ arms tightened around Helena’s waist when she took a corner a bit too sharply, though Helena knew it was out of excitement and not fear, her gloved fingers pressing into Helena’s ribs and the front of her helmet bumping against Helena’s shoulder. She trusted Helena, trusted her enough to hop on a two-wheeled death machine (Renee’s words) and hold on tight. But something was wrong. Helena couldn’t hear Cass laughing like she normally could when they rode and the wind wasn’t ripping them away, because they weren’t actually going that fast. Huh. Weird. 

They must have looked weird, Helena in jeans and a black leather jacket and a black helmet, Cass in rhinestones and stripes and glitter flames, zooming through Gotham at eight on a weeknight. Not the weirdest people in Gotham, though, because Gotham was full of freaks, which was a bit of a relief. Helena gripped the handlebars hard, she was wearing gloves but her knuckles were probably white beneath them, and turned onto the road running along Gotham River. 

Helena drove parallel to the river for a while, it was colder the closer they got to the riverbank and the water looked black at night, and only pulled off to one side when Cass tapped on her stomach three times. It wasn’t unusual, Cass liked to throw rocks and sticks and leaves into the water and Helena liked to find rocks and sticks and leaves for Cass to throw into the water, and she fiddled with the kickstand for a moment before turning the engine off. 

“Thanks.” Cass braced her hand on Helena’s shoulder as she got off the bike, she wasn’t quite tall enough to manage by herself but took offense when Helena offered assistance, and pulled her helmet off. Somehow her hair didn’t look terrible like Helena’s no doubt did, Cass never struggled with helmet hair, and she set her helmet down on the seat. “Can we go throw rocks in?” 

“Of course.” Helena shed her own helmet, scraped her hair off her face with her fingers, and followed Cass towards the rocky shore Gotham had the audacity to call a beach. It was nice to have traditions, though neither of them would ever call it that, the simple routine of picking out flat stones and big sticks for Cass to chuck into the river made Helena’s chest feel warm. Not like how Dinah made her feel warm, she figured different friendships had different feelings, but warm all the same. 

They were quiet for a while, the only sound splashing and the faint roar of cars from behind them, and then Cass sighed deep in her chest and didn’t take the next rock Helena offered her. For a moment, Cass looked incredibly sad, and Helena wondered if killing whatever had upset Cass would be too much of an overreaction. It was hard to say, but she figured she’d let Cass talk before jumping straight to murder. 

“How old were you when your family died?” Cass asked and Helena blinked. Alright. Not what she was expecting, but she could work with that. She stretched her legs out in front of her, Cass was taller when Helena was sitting down, and turned the rock over in her fingers. 

“Nine.” Helena had been eight and a half, but she preferred to round up. She had been very proud of her age at the time, she was older than most of the girls in her class and a fair bit taller, and when people had asked her age she had always said nine. She had been the eldest of the third generation of the Bertinellis, her father’s brothers had all died before they were old enough to have children, and now she was the only Bertinelli left. 

Cass sighed again, toeing at the pebbled beach, and rubbed the back of her neck. “Huh. So you’ve had no parents for twice as long as you did have parents.”

“Yeah. I mean, I wouldn’t say it like that, but I guess so.” Jesus, Helena had never thought about it in that way, but Cass was right. Fucking hell. Oh, Christ, now was not the time to have an existential crisis about her parents. Focus on Cass. 

“Dude.” Cass said, looking down at Helena with a frown. “That’s fucked. When I asked Harley about her family, she just told me they sucked major balls and wouldn’t tell me anything else.” 

“Watch your language. Why are you asking Harley about her parents?” 

“Well, I was going to ask Renee and Dinah, too, but Harley said that you were the expert in having no parents so I should ask you first.” 

“Of course she did.” That sounded like some shit Harley would say. Harley Quinn was many things, but tactful wasn’t one of them. Honestly, Helena was a little offended. She didn’t have no parents, she had dead parents. Very different things. Having no parents implied she had a shitty childhood, which she didn’t. (Well, from ages zero to nine, anyways. After nine, it was hit or miss.) “Do you want to talk about it or no? We don’t have to.” 

Cass sat down, her left leg pressed to Helena’s right, and sighed again. Rocks shifted beneath them, the river glittered black in front of them, and it was nice to sit, to be quiet, to know that Cass was there and she trusted Helena enough to talk to her about this stuff. Or not talk. Whatever floated Cass’ boat. Helena picked up another rock, smooth and round and white, and examined it for a moment before putting it into her pocket. She and Pino had collected stones when they were children, until Helena was no longer allowed to play in the dirt or throw rocks in the water or build tiny houses out of sticks, and every time she went out with Cass she kept at least one rock. 

“I can’t remember my parents anymore. I was three when they left, so I couldn’t remember anything specific, but I used to be able to picture something when I thought of my parents, you know? But I don’t anymore. I just know I had them, and they left me, and I didn’t need them and I didn’t want them, but I liked being able to think about them. Now it’s nothing. Just empty space. I lost them.” Cass very rarely spoke this much at a time, she preferred shorter sentences and quick insults, and her voice caught on the last word, she didn’t sound like she was crying but she sounded like she was close and Helena knew that she couldn’t reasonably murder what was distressing Cass, but by God she wanted to and if she could have taken those thoughts out of Cass’ head and stomped them to death she would have.

Helena waited until she was sure Cass was done to speak, pushing more hair out of her face because it was at that terrible length where she couldn’t pull it into a ponytail properly but it was constantly falling into her face no matter how often she tucked it behind her ears. She blew a deep breath out of her nose, Helena was terrible at giving advice and especially bad at emotions, but there were exactly three and a half people Helena would actually make an effort for and one of them was sitting right beside her. (Dinah and Renee were two, Harley was the half.)

“Sometimes, I can’t remember my dad’s voice. I wake up in the morning and I don’t know what my mom’s perfume smelled like. I’ve forgotten the colour of my dad’s eyes now, and I couldn’t tell you if my mom liked skirts or pants more. I can’t remember how old my dad was when he died, I don’t know what my dad’s laugh sounded like, I have no idea what my mom’s singing sounds like. I lose more and more of them every day.” 

That probably wasn’t what Cass had wanted to hear, but it was the first time Helena was able to admit it to herself, let alone admit it out loud. She had memories, flashes, specific things burned into her brain, but the details were slipping through the cracks and she knew that eventually she’d have nothing left of her parents, of her brother, besides those snippets of memory that hit her when she least expected it, and then those would vanish too. What would she have left of them when her memories faded? She would have Pino’s toy car and her mother’s face and the single picture of the four of them she kept in her nightstand. Nothing else. 

“Dude, you seriously aren’t helping.” 

“Right. My bad.” Helena tapped a finger on her leg, searching her brain for something uplifting to say. She wasn’t great at this. Honestly, she was pretty bad at this. “Listen, parents suck. They suck hard, and you’re allowed to forget about them. It’s okay to forget, Cass. You don’t need your parents and you don’t need the memory of them. Parents aren’t the end-all, not even close. I didn’t have mine, and look how I turned out.” 

“You? You’re the most awkward person I’ve ever met in my entire life. You look like you’re about to be sick every single time someone touches you and once you fell down an entire flight of stairs because a girl was checking you out.” Cass grinned, resting her head on Helena’s shoulder as she looked out at the water. “But I guess you might have a tiny bit of a point. Do you think I’m going to turn out okay?” 

“Hell yeah, dude. You’re the coolest person I know. Cooler than all of us combined.” 

“I don’t know. Dinah’s pretty cool.” 

“She is. But you’re cooler.” Helena, before she was really aware of what she was doing, turned and kissed the top of Cass’ head, shifting one of her arms so it was around Cass’ shoulders. “Parents suck. But you’ve got us now, okay? You have Harley and Renee and Dinah and me, and we’ve got you.”

“And Bruce.” 

“And Bruce. What I’m trying to say is, don’t sweat it. There’s one right way to be a family. Family isn’t just parents and a kid. Family can be four angry idiots and a cool kid with a really bright future ahead of her.” 

“And a hyena.” 

“Yes, and a fucking hyena.” Helena rolled her eyes, but she was smiling despite herself, and she kissed the top of Cass’ head again. “No matter what, kiddo, we got you. If someone’s stealing your lunch money, I’ll kick their ass and then Dinah will kick their ass and then Renee will kick their ass and then Harley will, I don’t know, do whatever she does. Roller skate them to death?” 

“Stealing my lunch money? How old do you think I am?” Cass pulled a face, looking up at Helena with the eyes she used when Helena completely fumbled a reference. She looked a bit more calm, and Helena rubbed her shoulder for a moment. “Have you ever been to school in your life?” 

“I dropped out in fourth grade.” Helena had never gone back to school, she could read and write and spell and do fairly basic math, but Luca thought that he could teach her everything she needed to know and hadn’t bothered to enroll her when she went to live with him. She hadn’t been to an actual school in sixteen years and her understanding of it was limited to the old movies Dinah and Renee liked to watch. “Do people not have lunch money anymore? People used to steal mine.”

“Wait, you went to school when there was lunch money? How old are you?” 

“That’s entirely irrelevant. My point is, who cares if you remember your parents? You don’t need them. You’ve got us. Always.” 

“Promise?” Cass stuck out her pinky and sighed loudly when Helena stared at it, taking Helena’s hand and hooking her pinky around Helena’s own littlest finger. What the fuck was this? “It’s a pinky promise. If you break a pinky promise, you die.” 

“You die?” Helena squeezed Cass’ finger gently, she had never heard of a pinky promise but she was fairly certain that wasn’t how things worked. “Are you sure?” 

“Positive. So you can’t break it, okay? I don’t want you to die.” Cass put her head back on Helena’s shoulder and shut her eyes, taking a deep breath. “And Helena?” 

“Yeah?” 

“You’re pretty cool, too. Even though you do lame stuff sometimes and also that one time you walked into the glass door and broke your nose. I still think you’re cool. Like in Renee’s movies where there’s the aunt that comes around and hangs out and gives good advice but never has a boyfriend. That’s you.” 

If Helena had enough emotional maturity to let herself cry, she might have right then, but that would require way more of a handle on her feelings than she had, so she settled for kissing Cass’ head for the third time and looking back out at the river. “I’m going to choose to take that as a compliment.” She resented the implication that she’d ever have a boyfriend, Helena’s interest in dating men was about the same as her interest in eating rat poison, but it was the nicest thing Cass had ever said to her, so she’d take it. 

Cass said nothing, yawning so widely her jaw cracked, and settled against Helena’s side. Helena couldn’t imagine it was very comfortable, Helena’s body was hard and bony, all jutting angles and sharp edges, and she shifted very slightly to hopefully create some padding with her jacket. Helena and Cass sat like that, quiet and still and peaceful, until a cloud blocked out the moon and Helena realized it was eleven-thirty. Did fourteen year-olds have bedtimes? Did Cass have a bedtime? Having a bedtime for Cass and then never enforcing it did seem like a Harley move, but if Helena was the cool aunt in one of Renee’s movies, she didn’t want to force Cass to go to bed. Wow, parenting was tough. She should never have kids. 

Helena drove home slowly for two reasons. The first was that she could hear Cass yawning at every red light and the second was that it was pretty fucking dark outside and she wasn’t in the mood to flip her bike because she refused to be careful. Cass had her arms tight around Helena’s torso and when her hand slipped down a fraction of an inch, Helena remembered she had stitches in her stomach. Aw, fuck. She had forgotten about those, and as soon as she remembered they existed they started to itch again. 

By the time Helena parked in the garage beneath Dinah’s building, Cass was practically snoring, her chin resting on Helena’s shoulder and her head lolling, helmet cracking every so often against Helena’s. It was weirdly sweet and Helena was very careful not to jostle her too much as she lifted Cass off the bike. Cass wasn’t quite asleep but she wasn’t far off, her mouth hanging open and her eyes closed. Yeah, it was very sweet, and Helena was not a softie and she wasn’t a fucking sap but she used her hip to open the doors as she carried Cass up the stairs, using her elbow to keep Cass’ head cushioned. 

There was a glittery footprint on the front of the door to Dinah’s apartment, probably exactly where Harley had kicked it open, and the door wasn’t actually locked, which seemed fairly unsafe. Helena made a mental note to lock it and put the chain on once Cass was settled. Dinah, Harley, and Renee were talking loudly, shocking not a single person, and Helena shushed them as Cass stirred. 

She was halfway across Dinah’s living room, ready to put Cass in Dinah’s bed so she could have a proper sleep, when Cass patted her shoulder sleepily. “No. Out here with you.” 

“We might be noisy.” Helena warned, but she was already setting Cass down in the corner of the couch with no knives or bullet casings or singular socks. Harder than it looked, Dinah’s couch was covered with stray pencils and scraps of paper and several clean paint brushes, and Helena tucked her in beneath the largest and fluffiest blanket she could scrounge up. 

“Please. That kid can sleep through fuckin’ anything.” Harley waved it off, pouring a slug of something clear and foul-smelling into a mug and holding it out to Helena as she sat down on the floor. “Here. You better catch up.”

Helena took the mug, swishing it around for a moment. God, it smelled like fucking nail polish remover and had they finished all the fucking rum and Helena hissed as she swallowed it, ignoring Harley’s cheer. God, Harley was a fucking nuisance, but she was Helena’s friend, god damnit, so she let Harley tip another two fingers’ worth of whatever it was into her cup and decided to sip instead of chug. Probably a good idea, really, even though sipping it made the taste linger, and she scraped her fingers through her hair for what had to be the eight time that night, painfully aware of Dinah’s eyes on her raised arm. Helena was hit with the sudden urge to flex, which she didn’t do because it would be embarrassing, instead she rested her forearm on the top of her head and leaned back against the couch cushions, looking at the friends (what a weird word, friends) surrounding her, and smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter got way too long so prepare your slow-burn-loving hearts for part 2.


	6. v: does helena have friends? (part 2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Turns out Helena does have friends. Who the fuck knew.

“That’s so fucking sad, Helena! Are you fucking serious? You’ve never had a sleepover? Not even when you were a kid?” 

“Do you think my entire family getting shot to death in front of me really helped me secure a lot of slumber party invitations?” 

“Oh. Right.” Harley hiccuped, the light of the muted TV making the glitter smeared on her eyelids and cheeks sparkle. They were sprawled around Dinah’s living room, drinking whatever they had found in the back of Dinah’s liquor cabinet and having a mostly coherent conversation that Helena knew she wasn’t going to remember in twenty minutes. “Shit. So you’ve never played, like, truth or dare? Never have I ever? Seven minutes in heaven?” 

What the fuck were those? Renee snorted into her glass, maybe they didn’t have those games back in the 1700s or whenever Renee had been a kid, and Harley gasped way too dramatically when Helena shook her head. Cass was sleeping behind her, snoring quietly as she had been doing for a few hours now, and she didn’t even stir while Harley started screeching. “We have to play! Dinah, Renee, we have to fucking play, right? She’s never played fucking truth or dare or never have I ever or spin the bottle!”

“Too loud.” Dinah frowned, taking a sip of her drink and poking Harley with her toe. Dinah’s shirt had been steadily sliding down one of her shoulders for the past hour, each inch revealing more smooth brown skin, and Helena was actively not looking at her so she didn’t start twitching. “Well, I’m down. I used to love truth or dare when I was a kid.” 

“Yeah, fine..” Renee shrugged, emptying a mini bottle of whiskey into her glass. Dinah, for reasons unknown, had at least fifteen tiny bottles of alcohol stashed in her liquor cabinet, Renee was going through them steadily and Helena was really, really resisting the urge to comment on how they looked normal-sized in Renee’s tiny little hands. She wasn’t sure if she could actually get the words out properly with three mini bottles of Fireball warming up her insides, so it would probably be easier to not say it at all. 

“How do you play?” 

“The rules are literally in the name. I ask you truth or dare. You pick, truth or dare. If you pick truth, I ask a question that you have to answer truthfully. If you pick dare, I dare you to do something and you have to do it. I feel like you could have figured that out from context clues, honestly, but I di-fucking-gress.” 

Wow, from Harley’s explanation, this sounded like a really stupid game. It had to be meant for teenagers, because there was no fucking way any reasonable adult played this. Right? Why Harley wanted to play a game meant for kids was beyond Helena, but she was pleasantly buzzed and she liked sitting here with people she liked, her friends, and saying no would make her a buzzkill, so she poured a bit more whiskey into her glass. “Sure.” 

“Yay!” Harley clapped, flashing that wild grin again, and turned to Dinah cheerfully. “Dinah, truth or dare?” 

“Truth.” 

“When did you have your first kiss?” Oh, so it was that kind of game. Fuck. Good thing that wasn’t her question, because admitting she had never kissed anyone to Harley and Dinah and Renee would probably make her die of shame. And it wasn’t her fault, being raised in isolation with three gruff Italian men meant kissing was not something she had ever thought about, really. Luca and Sal and Massimo had no idea how to raise girls, when she’d first gotten her period none of them had looked her in the eye for a week. Massimo had taken her into town, sat in the car while she’d gone into the grocery store and burned red as she tried to describe what she needed to the elderly woman behind the counter, and they had never spoken about it again. So yeah, kissing was not exactly something she had experience with. 

“Uh, thirteen, I think.” Dinah twisted the cap off a tiny bottle of vanilla-flavoured vodka and poured half into her own cup, her fingers steady as she dumped the rest into Helena’s. There was still about an inch of whiskey in Helena’s glass, but the whiskey was cinnamon-flavoured so it didn’t really matter. “Behind the gym at lunch. We got caught and had detention for a week.” 

“Seems harsh.” Renee said, she was in the process of lining up the alcohol on the coffee table in order from most to least full and kept swigging from the bottles to even them out, which seemed counterproductive to Helena, not to mention gross. 

Dinah shrugged. “We were both in detention, so we just made out whenever the teacher left the room. Honestly, it was on them.” 

Helena took a long sip of her drink. She couldn’t imagine Dinah as a child, in Helena’s mind Dinah had always been a jaded twenty-something who wore a lot of gold jewellery and a lot of tight pants, who smoked and drank and swore a lot and took no shit from anybody. She couldn’t really imagine any of them as children, honestly, but she assumed Renee had grown up carving pictures into cave walls and wearing animal skins or whatever they did before electricity was invented; and she knew in her soul that Harley had bit other kids until they bled.

“Truth or dare?” Dinah leaned back on one elbow, propping her cheek on her hand as she looked at Helena. She had this way of looking at Helena, her gaze warm and bright, her lips parted just a tiny bit, a soft crinkle around the corners of her eyes, that made Helena want to combust. There was a fleck of mascara on her eyelid and a thin cut just below her eyebrow, like she had scratched too hard or used tweezers that were a little too sharp, and she was a work of fucking art.

“Truth.” Helena didn’t know exactly how this game worked, but she figured Dinah wouldn’t ask her any questions that she wouldn’t be able to answer the same way she figured if she let Harley ask her a question, she’d end up having to publicly admit she’d never had sex, which there was no way in fucking hell she was doing. So she’d save her dare answer (were there limits to how many times you could answer truth vs dare?) for Harley, and let Dinah ask her a question. 

“Hmm.” Dinah sucked her teeth, her brows knitting as her gaze raked over Helena’s face. “Which one of Harley’s tattoos would you get if you had to?” 

Oh, god. Harley had a lot of tattoos and they were all fucking hideous, from the _I’m Watching_ stamped on her lower back to the _Lucky You_ directly above her crotch to the words scrawled all over her thighs, Helena would honestly rather die a painful death than get any of Harley’s tattoos, they were so fucking ugly and not a single one of them was even, like, tastefully awful. 

“Do they have to be in the same place?” Helena examined the doodles on Harley’s legs, hearts and tally marks and words that were all horrifically misspelled, a few scribbled skulls and diamonds that she had clearly done herself. “Or can I pick a different spot?”

“Same place.” Dinah was looking at Harley’s tattoos now too, it was fairly easy considering Harley had changed into fluorescent pink shorts that contrasted horribly with her yellow bra, and Helena scowled at Harley’s tattoos for another few seconds before sighing. God, they were so bad.

“If I had to? Probably the heart.” Helena tapped Harley’s thigh, very careful not to graze her skin more than she absolutely had to, and took a small sip of her drink. Dinah nodded thoughtfully, a lock of hair falling from where it was tucked behind her ear. “Okay. Renee, truth or dare?” 

“Dare.” Renee took a sip of from one of the bottles and switched it with another, she had started arranging them in an order that made very little sense to Helena but probably made perfect sense to Renee, and changed two of the bottles again. 

Helena drank a bit more of the vodka-whiskey mix so she could think about what to dare Renee to do, she really didn’t know what to ask. Was this game supposed to be hard? “Dare you not to drink until your next turn.” 

Oh, Renee was for sure going to strangle her. She looked at Helena like Helena had just suggested she stop breathing until her next turn, but she put the bottle down and leaned back into the cushions, right beside Cass, who was sleeping so soundly she didn’t wake up when Harley and Dinah started cackling. Dinah had a nice laugh, it lit up her entire face and Helena’s entire world, and she was clutching Harley’s bony shoulder as she gasped for breath. 

“Helena, you’re fucking incredible.” Dinah wiped her eyes, smudging a bit more of her mascara, and swallowed a mouthful of her drink. Harley poured herself another glass of rum, she had left glittering red lipstick all over the rim and it was smudged around her mouth and a bit was on the back of her hand, though somehow there was nothing smeared on her teeth. 

“Truth or dare, Harley.” Renee was probably never going to speak to Helena again, but, god, Dinah calling her incredible was more than fucking worth it. This game was pretty stupid, if Helena was being entirely truthful, she didn’t understand the point. Was there supposed to be a point to asking each other random questions and daring each other to do dumb things, or was it one of those bonding activities Helena didn’t quite understand? Probably a bonding thing. 

She didn’t bond with people, and that was the issue. She hadn’t had friends when she was young, Helena had always been painfully shy and fairly quiet and hated talking to new people. She had also attended an all-girls Catholic school and two of her father’s goons had dropped her off and picked her up every day, which was shockingly not helpful when it came to making friends. So she had never told people about her feelings or talked about boys (yuck) or hung out with her friends after school. 

It was nice, to do this, to listen to Dinah ask Renee about Ellen and Renee dare Dinah to drink a mini bottle of vodka in a single swallow. To sit with these women who cared about her, to hear Cass breathe deeply, to watch Renee stir her drink with a toothpick and Harley eat directly from a jar of peanut butter and Dinah take out a cigarette about once every five minutes before remembering Cass was in the room and tuck it back behind her ear. 

“Truth or dare?” Harley asked Helena, kicking her feet up onto the coffee table and immediately knocking over an empty bottle of rum. Every one of her toenails was a different sparkly colour and tiny rhinestones studded each like miniature stars. Jesus, even her feet were tacky, but a good kind of tacky, the kind of tacky Harley seemed to have trademarked. 

“Dare.” 

“Dare you to let me give you a tattoo.” 

Fucking motherfucking fuck. “Right now?” 

“Yeah.” Harley picked up one of the bags she had dropped on the floor and for some fucking reason there was a tattoo gun inside, because apparently she had been planning this or she just carried tattooing supplies around with her all the time. Probably both, honestly, Harley was constantly drawing on herself and Renee had been forced to physically stop her from giving Cass a tattoo at least five times. “I always bring my stuff with me.”

“In case there’s a tattoo emergency?” Dinah huffed a laugh, flicking some hair out of her face. She was being slowly absorbed into the couch, brown skin against red fabric, watching Helena and Harley and Renee with a heavy-lidded gaze. She looked sleepy and pretty and her eyes were so, so soft. 

“Exactly. I’m not an animal. Are you down, Crossbow Killer?” Harley waggled her dark eyebrows, they were stark against her chalk-white skin and pale eyes and platnium hair, and Helena was going to fucking kill her. But what she wasn’t going to do was refuse the dare, because she wasn’t a fucking wimp. 

“Hell yeah, you janky-ass clown. Where do you want to put it?” Helena raised one of her own eyebrows, she wasn’t afraid of pain or tattoos or needles (she had a tattoo already) but if she was a little bit more sober, she would have feared Harley’s quite frankly terrible tattoo ideas. Tragically, she was pleasantly drunk, so when Harley plugged in her tattoo gun and pulled on a pair of latex gloves, Helena rolled up the left sleeve of her shirt and offered up her arm. 

“First time?” Harley asked, wiping Helena’s bicep with an alcohol wipe. Huh. Helena didn’t peg Harley for a sterile type. She was smiling, broadly, which made Helena more than a little concerned, and she pursed her lips as she looked down at the bare skin Helena had given her. Dinah had scooted over so she could watch properly, lying on her stomach on the couch while Helena propped her arm on the coffee table. God, didn’t tattoos hurt more on muscle? Helena’s biceps were hard and toned and flecked with thin scars, scars from fighting, from Massimo and Sal and Luca, less scars than she had given them, but scars all the same. 

“No.” Helena offered a much smaller grin in return and oh, Christ, Harley wasn’t even going to sketch something out. Fuck. It wasn’t like she didn’t trust Harley (nobody did) but it was fucking permanent. The needle bit into her arm, making Helena exhale hard through her teeth, and Dinah propped herself up with one arm and reached for Helena’s hand with the other. Dinah laced her fingers through Helena’s and squeezed gently, rubbing her thumb along Helena’s knuckles. Every single other thought was forcibly yanked from Helena’s head. 

“You have a tattoo?” Dinah’s hand was warm, there were calluses on her palms and a few on her fingers, calluses that Helena knew came from fighting because they were rubbing against her own from fighting. She had nice hands, not small or gentle or soft, her fingers were crooked and her nails worn down, but hands that had seen fights and won fights and spent a lot of time wrapped around a steering wheel or a microphone. “Shit. I didn’t figure you for the type.” 

“I’m full of surprises.” Helena flinched when Harley wiped a bit of ink off, she didn’t want to look at the tattoo until it was done so she didn’t flip her shit, and Dinah traced a circle onto the back of Helena’s hand. She was wearing a single ring on her middle finger, a gold band with a bird carved into the front, it was a little too big for her and just a tiny bit tarnished. It was nice, Dinah normally wore a lot of jewellery and Helena never looked at her rings too closely because they changed day-to-day, and a little bit cold where it touched Helena’s skin. 

Renee snorted from her side of the couch, where she had tucked herself beneath a blanket with a brimming glass of rum clutched between her hands like a cup of coffee. “Sorry. You’re very surprising, Helena. Truly, the most surprisingest woman I’ve ever met.” 

Alright, so Renee needed to be cut off. It would be very difficult to take her drink from her, however, because trying to take Renee’s alcohol from her would be like trying to cut off one of her hands, so Helena left it alone. When Renee started slurring, it normally meant she’d be asleep in about ten minutes (five if Helena was being entirely truthful) and then she’d stop baldly insulting them. Well, hopefully. Renee talked in her sleep. 

“Where is it?” Dinah went on as if Renee had never said anything, as always, still drawing circles onto Helena’s hand. It took Helena a moment to realize she was asking where the tattoo was, a moment too long, but Helena was drunk so she could blame it on that instead of on how Dinah’s long fingers were twined with her own and how her touch was leaving goosebumps on Helena’s hand. 

“Ribs.” Helena dug her fingertips into Dinah when Harley went over a particularly sensitive place on her bicep and immediately stopped when she realized she might be hurting her and if that happened Dinah might let go and if Dinah let go of her she might die. That was a little dramatic, but Helena was a drama queen when she was drunk. Fucking sue her. 

“Aw, man. You can’t get cooler than me, Helena. You’re already so fucking cool and I have a reputation to maintain.” Dinah smiled, just enough to show off a single dimple, and the pounding in Helena’s ears wasn’t just because Harley was apparently using a rusty butter knife to carve something into her arm. “Do I have to get a ribcage tattoo now so I can be as cool as Helena?” 

This was asked to no one in particular, but Helena nodded and swore violently under her breath as Harley jabbed her in the arm again. Okay, tattoos were not supposed to hurt that much. Like, they hurt, fucking duh, but the one on her ribs didn’t hurt nearly as much and the ribs were supposed to hurt more. “Ow. Fucking shit, are you peeling my fucking skin off?” 

“No. Don’t look.” Harley curved her shoulders so Helena couldn’t see her own arm, it occured to Helena very suddenly that Harley was doing this in the light from the muted TV, which was to say very little light at all, and Helena should have maybe thought this through a little bit more. Christ. 

Helena didn’t look. Her stitches, the itching had subsided the less she thought about them, were starting to bug her again, maybe because of the hole Harley was gouging into her arm, though that didn’t make a lot of sense, but she was itchy now and her new tattoo was already starting to itch and wow she should have just said no to the dare. 

“What do you think, doll?” Harley said to Dinah, still contorted awkwardly so Helena couldn’t see the tattoo, and Dinah made a noise of approval. She didn’t ask Renee, partially because Harley didn’t value Renee’s opinion on tattoos (Renee was an old lady and thought tattoos were for sailors, whatever the fuck that meant) and mostly because Renee was snoring with her chin on her chest. 

“Lemme bandage it up. Excellent dare, me. I’m very proud.” 

“I’m not allowed to see it?” Helena asked, a little indignantly, but for fuck’s sakes it was her fucking arm. She wasn’t allowed to see her new tattoo that Harley had dared her to get and hurt like a goddamn bitch? “Is that part of the dare?” 

“It is now.” Harley wrapped a lot of gauze around Helena’s bicep. God fucking damnit. Dinah laughed out loud when she saw Helena’s face, her delighted laugh, the one that made her eyes and Helena’s chest light up, and squeezed Helena’s hand gently. Neither of them had let go, Helena was very careful to hold Dinah’s hand so she could slip out of the grip if necessary, but Dinah hadn’t even stopped drawing on her knuckles. “Oh, don’t give me that look, sugarlips. It’s a great tattoo. You’re gonna love it.” 

Harley switched her tattoo gun off and got to her feet, taking her ink-stained gloves off with her teeth, which seemed like it would taste really bad, but Harley barely had taste buds, so it was probably fine. Thankfully, the tattoo didn’t actually look super big, it wasn’t like Harley had covered her entire bicep, it was maybe half the size of her palm and easily hidden if it was hideous. 

“One to ten, how bad?” Helena looked over at Dinah, her noise of approval was hard to read a lot of the time, and Dinah sucked her teeth. “Oh, Jesus. It’s hideous. I know it. Ugh, Luca is going to fucking kill me.” Luca didn’t believe in tattoos, the same as Renee, and the first time Massimo had come home with a snake on his forearm Luca had screamed at him for three hours and made Helena swear to never get a tattoo. Massimo had two full sleeves plus his chest and neck done now, and Helena’s ribcage inking had been one of the first things she’d done after leaving Sicily, so his methods really didn’t work as well as he thought they did, but this was going to be hard to hide if and when she ever went back to see them. 

“It’s not hideous.” Dinah said carefully, sitting up so Harley could crawl onto the couch between her and Cass. She was a shitty liar when she was drunk and Helena groaned, running a hand over her face. She would have put her head in her hands, but that would have involved letting go of Dinah, which she absolutely was not willing to do at that moment. “I wouldn’t have picked it, but it’s not the worst.” 

“You’ll be fine.” Harley dragged out the last word, she had wormed her way beneath the massive blanket wrapped around Cass, and grinned at Helena, showing off white teeth against red lips and white skin. There was still no lipstick on her teeth, which Helena thought was fucking annoying because whenever Helena wore lipstick she tasted it for days. “What time is it?” 

Dinah looked at the screen of her phone and made a face, beginning to thumb through something without answering Harley. She was also very easily distracted when she was drunk, and only when Harley coughed violently did Dinah look up. “Two-fifteen.” 

Two-fifteen. God, Helena was staying up super late these days. Her eleven-thirty to seven-thirty schedule had been royally fucked since she had gotten stabbed and while sleeping more than eight hours at night was nicer than Helena had thought it might be, she hated throwing off her routines. 

Unless, of course, her routines were being messed up because Dinah was pressing play on some music and putting her phone back down on the coffee table. Helena rolled down her sleeve as she watched Dinah begin to mouth the words, careful not to let the fabric rub against the bandage. This tattoo was going to be bad enough as it was, she didn’t need to add insult to injury by smudging it. 

Helena liked looking at Dinah. There was something lovely in the way she tipped her head back and mimed the words of the song at the ceiling, in the length of her neck and the shifting of her hair. She was still holding Helena’s hand, they hadn’t let go once, and she had started tapping the beat of the music onto Helena’s knuckles. Helena didn’t know the song, she listened to nothing but the operas Luca liked and the occasional bit of Italian rap from Massimo, but it might be her new favourite if only for the feeling of Dinah’s fingers as they danced across her skin. Why Dinah had decided that quarter after two in the morning was time to listen to music was completely beyond Helena, Cass and Renee were snoring and Harley was already beginning to nod off (which was genuinely shocking, because Harley usually only slept when she couldn’t keep herself upright anymore).

And they sat. Dinah on the couch, Helena on the floor, Dinah humming or mouthing the songs, Helena watching her do it, and the entire universe seemed to be in this room, in Helena and Dinah and Harley and Renee and Cass, in the music, in the flickering light from the TV, in Dinah’s easy smile. Helena’s arm itched and her stomach itched and her eyes were gritty with sleep but god, she would have let herself get stabbed again if it meant she could watch the rise and fall of Dinah’s chest as she murmured the words to a song Helena didn’t understand for a few moments longer. 

“Dance with me.” 

Helena would have protested, but Dinah was smiling wide and she was drunk and sleepy and Dinah was pulling her to her feet, dragging Helena to the kitchen, her fingers strong and steady. It was a new song, a slow song with quiet lyrics, and Dinah slid one arm around Helena’s neck. Helena didn’t know what to do with her free hand and Dinah’s body was warm against her own, so close Helena could feel Dinah’s heartbeat against her ribs, Dinah was shorter than her and lovelier than her and she took Helena’s wrist in her hand and placed it on her hip. 

“Do you know how to dance?” Dinah asked, interrupting the internal meltdown Helena was having over how neatly Dinah’s hip fit into her hand, how strange and wonderful it felt to touch someone properly, how this close she could smell vanilla on Dinah’s breath and lavender in her hair. 

“No.” Helena admit, because when would she ever have had the opportunity to learn how to fucking dance? How did Dinah know how to dance? It seemed to come naturally to her, the same way most things did, she moved like water, fluid and graceful, as if she had been put on this Earth for no other reason than to slow-dance with a drunk awkward loser at three in the morning. “Am I bad at it?” 

“Nah. You’re cute when you’re nervous.” Dinah spun them in a slow circle, apparently uncaring that she had just given Helena an aneurysm. Cute. Dinah thought she was cute. Dinah fucking Lance, the coolest, hottest, badass-est, funniest person Helena had ever met in her entire life, thought she was cute. Helena had been stabbed, shot at, knocked unconscious, had guns held to her head, had the shit kicked out of her many times, but never in her life had she been closer to death. 

“But I’m always nervous.” 

“And you’re always cute.” 

Helena felt dizzy, though that could have been the fact that she was drunk and tired, she shut her eyes for a moment and tried to figure out what to say back that wasn’t just I’d die for you. That seemed like coming on a little strong. She couldn’t actually manage to pick out a coherent thought and settled for a smile, letting Dinah spin her again. 

“God, you’re ripped.” Dinah said suddenly, squeezing Helena’s arm lightly. She was all muscle, Helena had been training since she was nine and her entire body was hard and lean and unyielding, Renee always asked her how she had managed to get herself abs and Helena always told her that having a functioning liver normally helped (Renee smacked her whenever she said that). “Flex for me?” 

Helena flexed her bicep and Dinah grinned, showing off those irritatingly adorable dimples. “Again.” 

“I’m pretty sure this counts as groping me.” Helena flexed again, Dinah was more than welcome to grope her any time she wished, and Dinah gave her another squeeze. 

“Oh, you love it.” Dinah looped both arms around Helena’s neck and nudged her backwards a step, still swaying in time to the music. Helena felt way too hot, her skin was prickling and her face was flushed and there was something curled tight in her stomach that got tighter when Dinah slid her fingertips beneath the collar of Helena’s shirt. “You look tired. Are you tired?” 

Helena had never been more awake in her life. She had no words for the shuddering warmth that ran through her veins when Dinah touched her, the way her hands trembled on Dinah’s hips, the electricity crackling in her chest like she’d just been struck by lightning. “I’m alright.” 

“You’re not good at lying to me.” Dinah nudged Helena back again, twice, until Helena’s heel smacked into something and she swore. Dinah had maneuvered them towards her bedroom door neatly and also without Helena realizing, and Helena’s heart leapt into her throat and stayed there, pounding so fast and so hard she could feel it in her ears. “Are you okay sharing? I’m good on the floor.” 

Oh, Jesus Christ. Harley and Cass and Renee were taking up all of the couch, how all three of them managed to snore so loudly without waking each other up was beyond Helena, and oh Jesus fucking Christ, Dinah was offering to share her bed. Could you die from your heart beating too fast? Wasn’t that a heart attack? Was she going to have a heart attack? Dinah smiled up at her, reassuringly, a smile that seemed like it had been made to turn Helena’s stomach inside-out, and opened her bedroom door. 

“I’m not making you sleep on the floor.” Helena followed Dinah into her bedroom. She’d never been in Dinah’s room before, she wasn’t sure why, but it was fucking perfect. The walls were covered in photos and posters and yellow paint; clothes were piled on a red chair in the corner and on the dresser and on the floor; comforters and pillows hung halfway off the bed and her laptop sat charging on her nightstand. “Also there’s no room on the floor.” 

That much was true, Dinah’s bedroom floor was littered with clothes and a few tiny pillows and random cords tangled into knots that looked impossible to undo. Dinah gave her a rather lazy finger and scooped up an armful of clothes. “Cool. Pick whatever you want, it’s all clean. I’ll be back in a minute.” 

Dinah didn’t close her bathroom door behind her, she just flicked the lights on and began to scrub the makeup off her face. Helena watched her do it, her eyes catching involuntarily on the stripe of brown skin between the waist of Dinah’s sweatpants and the hem of her shirt. Two dimples, nearly identical to the ones on her face, were visible on either side of her spine, and Helena wondered very briefly how it would feel to wrap her hands around Dinah’s waist and tuck her thumbs into the dimples. Jesus, she was losing her mind. 

She shook the thought out of her head and picked out a tank top and some pyjama pants from the pile on the chair, the top was black and faded with a skull printed on the front and the pants didn’t fit, she had to tie them twice around her narrow waist and the cuffs were three inches above the ankle, but they were soft and they smelled like Dinah and Helena would have been happy to wear nothing else for the rest of her life. 

When Helena turned back around, Dinah was looking at her. Not staring, not leering, just looking, her face clean and hair tied up in a knot on top of her head. She had changed too, into flannel shorts and a white shirt that was not quite see through but see through enough to make Helena’s heart skip a beat, and when Dinah spoke again it was in a slightly softer tone than usual. 

“After you.” Dinah said, jerking her chin at the bed. It was a big bed, way bigger than the one Helena had at home, and the sheets were patterned with tiny birds. Canaries. She didn’t know why Dinah had picked the name Black Canary, she had never really thought to ask, but the idea that she needed to match her bedsheets to her name was so fucking cute Helena nearly laughed out loud. God, she was drunk. 

Dinah waited until Helena had settled herself on the mattress to crawl in beside her, dragging over several blankets and pillows. Why the fuck would anyone need such a big bed? Helena had slept in a twin for her entire life and here Dinah was, in a bed that could sleep her and Helena and Renee and Harley and Cass and probably Bruce too, alone. They got comfortable in silence, not a bad silence but the silence that came when two people were tired and drunk and one of them didn’t know how to act around other people (Helena) and the other was fucking wonderful (Dinah). 

“Thank you for dancing with me.” Dinah said as she turned off the lamp beside her bed, rolling back over slowly to face Helena. “You’re a really good friend. Actually, I think you’re my best friend.” 

Helena had never had a best friend before. Did adults have best friends? Were they called something different? Pino had always called her his best friend, but she had always said she was his best sister and brothers and sisters couldn’t be friends. That inevitably made him cry and then she’d have to comfort him and say that she loved him and if they weren’t siblings they’d be best friends, which worked most of the time. Was best friendship the feeling Helena got when she looked at Dinah, the anxious sort of heat in her chest, the way Dinah’s smile was brighter than any star in the sky? Weird. She’d have to ask Renee. 

“I’ve never had a best friend.” Helena admit, reaching down to scratch her stitches. She wasn’t supposed to scratch them but they fucking itched and besides, the wound was mostly healed and it felt so much better when she scratched them. “Wow. That felt really lame to say out loud.” 

“You’re not lame. I don’t have lame best friends.” Dinah didn’t take her eyes off Helena’s as she used one finger to tuck a strand of Helena’s hair behind her ear, her nail brushing Helena’s cheek before tracing the shell of her ear. Dinah tugged on her earlobe, just once, smiling wide, and moved her hand back to her side. “Go to sleep, Crossbow Killer. Harley is going to be up and whining for waffles before you know it.” 

Harley did love waffles and she did refuse to make them for herself, whenever she stayed over Renee and Dinah were forced to make chocolate chip waffles and bacon and eggs and whatever else Cass asked for (Harley had recently discovered that getting Cass to ask for something yielded much better results than Harley herself asking, and since they liked all of the same foods, no one said no. It was a really good strategy and Helena was honestly annoyed she hadn’t thought of it herself). 

“Fine. Goodnight, Dinah.” 

“ _Bona notti_ , Helena.” 

Helena looked over, eyes wide. Dinah had remembered. She had absolutely butchered the pronunciation, but she had remembered. Dinah grinned, a thousand words unspoken in her smile, and shut her eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> dinah: you're so cute let me feel your muscles hold your hand and slow dance with you. also i'm going to give you my clothes and play with your hair and stitch you up tenderly after you get stabbed. you're my best friend in like a gay way. 
> 
> helena: your laugh lights up my universe and i feel like i'm about to die when you touch me and we're sharing a bed and my entire heart bursts when you smile at me. damn, love me some deep, not-gay friendship that is definitely completely platonic and not even a little bit gay.


	7. vi: where is renee's medal?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the birds of prey share a single brain cell and it is not helena's turn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> unedited but i felt it was important to post this as soon as i finished.

There was an arm slung across her waist.

A warm arm, pressed against the bare skin of her stomach, keeping her there. Keeping her safe. A set of fingers curled into her hip, calluses scraping her skin, and a blonde head tucked into her shoulder. A leg resting against her own, firm with muscle, and soft breath on her neck. For a moment, Helena wondered if she was dead and this was her own personal heaven, if God had stolen her while she slept and rewarded her for avenging her family with Dinah’s skin against hers.

And then she heard Harley’s piercing shriek and Harley was for sure not going to Heaven, so this was real. Helena was really lying in Dinah’s bed, sunlight warming her face and Dinah warming her heart and a strange sort of peace in her bones. She didn’t move a single inch, terrified that if she did Dinah might shift, might detangle herself from Helena, and she’d crumble into pieces if Dinah stopped touching her. 

Helena didn’t really know what to do. No one had ever touched her like this, cheek pressed to her collarbone, arm dangerously low over her waist, holding her close. She didn’t know people actually did this in real life, they did this in the movies Renee and Dinah liked, and in TV shows when Helena bothered watching them, but she didn’t really think it happened with real people. It was very strange. Not a bad strange, a good strange. The kind of strange that made Helena want to never, ever let Dinah go. 

Dinah was still fast asleep, her breath soft and steady. Helena was hit with the idea that they had gravitated towards each other in their sleep, that somehow when they had both drifted off their bodies had found each other in the darkness, that Helena’s sleeping self had recognized a feeling she couldn’t figure out when she was awake. It felt like someone slapping her upside the head, really, as if her brain was screaming something at her she couldn’t understand and getting frustrated when she didn’t get it. Had her subconsciousness become Renee? That was fucking terrifiying. 

Huh. It was nice to be held. Was this a normal thing best friends did? Curl up in bed together, sharing a blanket, sharing the air between them, wrap arms around each other and sleep in comfortable silence? Maybe. It was hard to say. Dinah sighed in her sleep, pulling Helena closer to her, and her breathing evened out again. Alright, it would for sure ruin the mood if Helena vomited on Dinah’s face out of sheer nerves, so she swallowed hard and tucked Dinah’s head beneath her chin. It felt like the right (well, not the wrong) thing to do and Dinah’s hair was very soft, it had fallen out of the bun while they slept and was splayed across the pillow and Helena’s chest like a halo. Helena felt like her brain was about to start leaking out of her ears. 

Okay. She was cuddling someone. Did people call it cuddling? Snuggling? Was there a specific name for it? God, she was bad at this. She, Helena Rosa Bertinelli, was cuddling Dinah Lance. They were in Dinah’s bed, underneath Dinah’s blankets, wearing Dinah’s clothes, cuddling. As friends. Best friends. Did people cuddle their best friends? Maybe she needed to check the Internet, use Goggle or whatever to see if this was a regular occurence between best friends. (Helena didn’t exactly know how the Internet worked, when she had lived in Gotham as a child she wasn’t allowed to use it and Luca thought that the government would try and steal your information if you used a computer, so she was still fairly wary of most technology that seemed commonplace. She only had a smartphone because Cass had forced her to buy one, Helena had owned a flip phone that she rarely used before Cass had bullied her into buying a real one, and she only used it to text or make calls or check the time). 

Harley and Cass and Renee sounded like they were having a vicious argument in Dinah’s kitchen, Helena caught the words _bitch, clown, baby, gay, tired, and teeth_ , which meant they were either assigning nicknames for the five of them plus Bruce, or Harley had bit someone. Possibly both. It was oddly comforting to listen to the three women bicker, to hear Harley’s yelping and Cass’ dry comments and Renee’s grumbling, and even more comforting to hold Dinah in her arms and feel Dinah’s breathy little sighs as she slept, to know that Dinah trusted her enough, felt safe enough around her to wrap herself up in Helena and sleep.

When Helena woke up for the second time, it was to an empty bed. She was shockingly disappointed. She could smell breakfast, though, waffles and coffee and fruit, and there was a folded sheet of paper on the pillow beside her head. Helena yawned, her jaw crunching in that unpleasant way it did when she first got up in the morning, and wondered if she had dreamed up Dinah’s embrace. Wouldn’t surprise her. Her dreams were normally either violent and bloody or vaguely homoerotic, sometimes both, and Dinah holding her would have been easy for her brain to make up.   
_  
H-  
Cass has big plans for us today. I left clothes on the bathroom counter. Use whatever stuff you need to get ready._

_P.S: You talk in your sleep and it’s adorable._

The note wasn’t signed, because who the fuck would have written it if not Dinah, and Helena read the words three times before she managed to absorb that A) she had to actually do things today and B) Dinah thought she was adorable. Adorable. Helena had never thought of herself as a particularly adorable person, she didn’t think of herself at all, really, but never adorable. She had a hard, angry face and a constant scowl and she was many, many things, but adorable was not one of them. Not to herself, at least. Adorable. Helena kinda liked being adorable. 

Helena made Dinah’s bed as best she could, there were way more blankets than any one person needed and at least a dozen pillows, and ran a hand over her face as she walked into Dinah’s bathroom and shut the door. 

Dinah had a nice bathroom. It wasn’t organized, her makeup bag was open and cluttered and a tub of lotion was tipped over beside the sink, but faded pictures were taped in rows along the edges of the mirror and her jewellery box sat beneath them, a bird carved into the wooden lid. Helena peered at the pictures as she washed her hands, Dinah’s soap was fancy and smelled like lemons, and she realized a few of the pictures were of her. 

Five of them, to be exact. One of her and Renee, both laughing; one of her with Cass on her motorcycle, flashing matching grins; one of her and Harley and Bruce, Bruce licking one of Helena’s cheeks while Harley licked the other, one of her and Dinah lying on the floor sharing a pair of earbuds, and the last one was Helena alone, her crossbow out and aimed at the camera. Helena couldn’t remember the context for any of them, but the fact that they were memories Dinah wanted to keep made something twist in Helena’s chest. 

The clothes on the counter were neatly folded, stacked in a pile in order of how Dinah believed they should be put on (she was weirdly pedantic about going underwear, bra, socks, shirt, pants with no deviations) and Helena examined each piece of clothing before she changed. Dinah had left Helena a pair of high-waisted jeans that probably reached Dinah’s ankles but barely came down past Helena’s knees and a collared white shirt striped pale yellow, plus a pair of underwear way skimpier than anything Helena normally ever wore. No bra. Of course not. 

The shirt looked good, which was strange. It wasn’t Helena’s style at all, but she looked almost normal. Like, not normal-normal, she looked awkward and long and pointy, but in Dinah’s clothes she could pass for a regular twenty-something woman living in the city. Huh. She had spent a lot of time in Dinah’s clothing recently, which she liked, all of Dinah’s clothes smelled like lemon and salt and faintly of lavender and even faintly-er of cigarettes, and while none of it actually fit properly, it was nice to see herself in clothes that weren’t her own. 

She pushed some hair off her forehead, a perk of having fairly short and straight hair was that it didn’t actually need to be combed too often, and thought about putting on a bit of makeup before she remembered that she absolutely could not wear Dinah’s makeup for a great many reasons. Okay. Her hair was messy but in a casual way, her face was clean, she was wearing clean clothes, she looked fine. She looked regular, and it was nice. 

Harley and Cass were sitting at the kitchen table with Bruce in another chair (Harley liked to say Bruce had a life outside of them and he came and went as he pleased) when Helena finally emerged, Renee was leaning against the counter while Dinah was stirring something with her back to Helena. 

“Morning, doll.” Harley said around a mouthful of waffle, offering a chocolate-smeared grin as Helena crossed the living room to the kitchen. Cass waved, she was forking down a stack of waffles like her life depended on it, and Renee looked like someone had run her over with a truck and she just grunted. Dinah was humming, lost in thought, Helena could see the bird tattooed on her shoulder blade through the straps criss-crossing her back. 

“Morning.” Helena took the glass of apple juice Renee pushed across the counter, she didn’t drink coffee unless it was the good Italian stuff, and she swished it around her mouth because her breath probably smelled like stale whiskey. “Hi, Bruce.” 

Bruce licked her hand, she had never liked how big his teeth were but he was a big softie, and returned to the mixing bowl full of scrambled eggs he was demolishing at roughly the same speed as Cass. Helena sat down beside Cass and ruffled her hair, earning a glare, and she had almost gotten a piece of waffle off Cass’ plate when Cass slammed her fork into the table between Helena’s first finger and thumb and made a face. “Hands off.” 

“Rude.” Helena drank some more juice. Her arm was itchy and Helena remembered (how the fuck did she forget?) the tattoo Harley had given her the night before. Shit. “Harley, if this tattoo is bad, I’m gonna fucking kill you.” 

“Harley gave you a tattoo? Can I get one?” Cass washed down her waffle with a gulp of juice and wiped her mouth on the back of her hand, she was wearing a clean pair of cut-offs and a grey hoodie, apparently today was a more subdued day. For her, at least, Harley wore leopard-print leggings and a pale pink crop top printed with little red hearts, she didn’t look like she’d been drinking all night, because of course she didn’t. 

“No.” Helena and Renee and Dinah said in unison, Dinah leaned over Helena’s shoulder to set down a plate in front of her. It was very sweet of her to get Helena a plate, almost as sweet as the way she paused and tucked more of Helena’s hair out of her face, right behind her ear, her touch warm and soft. Her fingertips lingered on Helena’s cheek for a fraction of a second, just long enough for Helena to feel them even after she moved away. 

“Why not?” Cass had already started to unwrap the bandage around Helena’s bicep, she was leaving chocolate fingerprints on Helena’s skin as well as the gauze, she stuck out her bottom lip and gave Helena her puppy-dog eyes. “You got one.” 

“Well, I’m an adult. You’re a kid.” 

“Fourteen isn’t a kid.” 

“Oh yes it is.” Renee put another waffle on Cass’ plate and watched as Cass peeled the bandage off Helena’s arm, for some reason Renee was wearing her sunglasses indoors and drinking black coffee out of a soup bowl. Helena had long ago stopped questioning Renee’s decisions and decided to focus on the black ink on her arm. 

Five arrows ran lengthwise along her bicep in not-quite straight lines, none of them were the same size and the linework was untidy (of course it was, Harley had been drunk and it probably wouldn’t have been much better if she was sober). It was perfect. Of course it was. Five arrows for the five of them (Harley was a sucker for cheesy shit like that) and each one was a different length because they were meant to represent their heights. Fitting that Harley chose permanent body modification to make fun of Renee, honestly. God, if Helena could have cried, she would have, but she settled for offering Harley a fist-bump. 

“You love it!” Harley cheered, somehow she had managed to fit more waffle in her mouth and her words were almost entirely incomprehensible, and Helena rolled her eyes. She did love it, but admitting it would make her look soft. “I told you you’d love it! Kid, we’re getting you a matching one.” 

“Cool.” Cass started in on her next waffle and Helena looked down at her plate, ignoring Renee as she began to rant about how tattoos were for hooligans and degenerates. Half a waffle and a peeled orange cut into segments (sprinkled with sugar, though Helena would never admit to it), the same thing she ate every time they had brunch. 

“You’re not getting a tattoo. You’re ten.” 

“Oh my god, I’m fourteen.”

“When you get to her age, it all blends together.” Dinah kissed the top of Cass’ head and smiled at Helena. Not her regular smile, a smile like they shared a secret, and she winked before plucking an orange wedge from Helena’s plate and returning to the kitchen. “You’re still not getting a tattoo, though. You’re too little.” 

“I’m taller than Renee.” 

“That’s not what I meant and you know it. If height equalled being a grown-up, Helena’d be like a million.” 

“Thanks.” Helena ate half a piece of orange, she would have worried about Harley or Cass stealing off her plate if not for the fact that Harley reacted to the idea of eating fruit the same way she reacted to the idea of eating cockroaches and the fact that Cass was cramming what had to be her fifth waffle into her mouth. “What big plans do we have today? I had to cancel my busy day of sitting around.” 

Cass held up a finger and swallowed hard. How that kid ate as much as a fucking hyena Helena would never know, but she assumed it had something to do with that Cass had spent most of her life unsure of where or when she’d eat again, so if Cass wanted to eat Dinah out of house and home, she was more than welcome. “There’s a carnival in Grant Park. I want to go.” 

“Uh-huh. And you remember the last time we went to a carnival, right?” Helena put her fork through another orange segment, raising an eyebrow at Cass. The last time the five of them had been to a carnival, it had involved way more masked goons and guns than Helena assumed a carnival should have. She had never been to a proper one, of course, so it was hard to say, but when your singular experience with a carnival was finishing a revenge plot and ending up in this ragtag bunch of women, you could never be sure. 

“I’m not fucking stupid. We’re going in broad daylight, no one is after us, and I can’t remember swallowing any Bertinelli diamonds recently, so I think we might be okay.” 

“Language.” Renee sipped her bowl of coffee, Cass swore way too much, and while it would have been easy to blame Harley, all of them cursed viciously around Cass. Helena assumed Cass had already told Harley and Dinah and Renee, none of them were reacting, and she ate some more orange before sighing. 

“Fine. I’m not driving.” 

“Don’t be silly.” Harley laughed, flashing chocolate-covered teeth. “Bruce can’t fit on your motorcycle.” 

Oddly enough, bringing a hyena the size of a small horse to a carnival was not the weirdest thing Harley had ever roped Helena into doing. It wasn’t fun, mind you, but considering Helena had once been talked into letting Harley do her makeup, Helena had no problem walking around with a hundred-pound feral cat wearing a hot-pink collar studded with diamonds and way too much eyeliner. Plus Bruce. Bruce’s collar was black and matched Harley’s and if Renee hadn’t put her foot down, Cass would probably be wearing one too. 

“Renee, you can’t drink in public. Cops don’t like that.” 

“I am a cop.” 

“You quit your job.” 

“That’s not the point.” 

“That is literally exactly the point. If you quit your job, you can’t…” 

Helena had no interest in debating the legality of Renee mixing vodka into her slushie, honestly, but she liked walking beside them, and she really liked the way that every so often Dinah’s hand would brush her own and stay there for a moment, grazing her palm or perpetually-bruised knuckles or the inside of her wrist. She was between Dinah and Cass, Cass was eating a stick of something called cotton (?) that was the size of her head and strips of tickets were hanging out of the pocket of her cut-offs, the sun beat down on them and Helena was fairly certain she was going to get a sunburn or at least a fuckton of freckles and she was very, very happy. 

Grant Park was big and pretty, all green grass and clean sidewalks and well-dressed people, and the carnival was nice. Well, nice enough. Helena thought it was a little weird, she didn’t get the appeal of cheap games and overpriced candy and rides that felt like they’d collapse underneath you at any moment, but Cass was clearly in her element and she liked watching Cass have fun. 

“Have you ever had cotton candy?” Cass asked, peering at Helena over her hot-pink sunglasses. Helena had never had cotton candy, she didn’t even know what it was besides that Cass had housed two sticks already and that it had stained her tongue blue, it looked like a weird cloud and Helena really didn’t know if she wanted to try it. 

“Nope.” Helena took a sip of the slushie she was sharing with Dinah, which tasted like artificial cherries and made her tongue hurt. There was no vodka in it, mostly because it was eleven in the fucking morning and Helena wasn’t an alcoholic, but it honestly could have used some. God, everything at this carnival was sugar in various forms. No wonder Cass loved it. 

“Here. It’s so good. Like crack.” Cass tore off a piece and handed it to Helena, who raised an eyebrow before she took the cotton candy. It was lighter than air and stuck to Helena’s fingertips, leaving little bits of blue on her skin. 

“Please don’t do crack. Just because Harley does doesn’t mean you should.” Helena put the cotton candy in her mouth. It dissolved immediately on her tongue, melting into a sugary puddle that made Helena cough. Jesus Christ, that was fucking sweet, tooth-rottingly sweet, disgustingly sweet, and she swore under her breath as she swallowed. “Fucking hell. I can feel a cavity forming.” 

“That’s the best part. Want more?” 

“Yeah.” 

Cass grinned and ripped off another chunk, waiting until Helena washed down the sugar with more sugar to hand it to her. On Cass’ other side, Harley fed a handful of popcorn to Bruce, who was trotting along cheerfully and scaring the absolute shit out of everyone who passed. Which, to be fair, if Helena saw a massive hyena leashed to a woman with face tattoos in leopard-print leggings and they were wearing matching collars, she might be a little afraid too. 

“Oh, shit! Dart balloons!” Cass spotted a booth and ran ahead, the tickets shoved in her back pocket flowing behind her like a tail. Dart balloons, as it turned out, was a game where you hit balloons with a dart. Who knew. Helena trailed behind Cass, careful not to let her get too far away, and shoved her hands into her pockets as Cass traded two tickets for ten darts. The man running the booth, tall and wiry with a thick beard, leered at Helena and then at Dinah when she and Harley and Renee caught up, his pale eyes flickering between the low neck of Dinah’s shirt and the strip of stomach exposed by the shirt Helena wore. Gross. 

Cass was not great at dart balloons. All but one of her throws went wide, she nearly sent a dart into the gross man’s eyeball, and she tugged on Helena’s hand impatiently once she had run out of darts. “Win one for me. You’re like, Robin Hood or whatever. I want the dragon.” 

“Yes. You got this, Helena.” Dinah took the slushie and glared at the man when he licked his lips, her death stare would make fucking Batman piss his pants, and he very smartly handed Helena ten darts and stopped staring down Dinah’s shirt. “You’re going to have to win us all a prize eventually, since you’re the only one with decent aim.” 

“I have great aim.” Renee protested, taking what Helena was sure she believed to be a subtle sip from her flask. “I could win you a prize.” 

“Yeah, if you were sober or cared enough.” 

“I care enough” 

“You’re not sober.” 

“I am not. Carry on.” 

Helena rolled her eyes and threw the first dart. She had never played balloon darts, or regular darts for that matter, but it didn’t really seem that much different from throwing knives. It wasn’t. Ten darts, ten balloons, ten solid thunks against the plywood backing. Maybe she needed to give Cass some lessons, in darts and in throwing knives. Self-defense or something like that. Renee nodded approvingly and Harley tossed a handful of popcorn in the air and Cass clapped her hands, accepting the massive purple dragon the man handed her and immediately handing it to Dinah to carry around for her. 

“Show me how to do that.” Cass had recently taken to tugging on Helena’s hand or wrist or sleeve when she wanted attention, which considering Helena was at least ten inches taller than her, was a good idea. Plus, it was sort of nice. It was what Pino had done when he wanted her to look at something or listen to him, he had left sticky smears on the cuffs of all her shirts, something Cass thankfully did not do, and Helena took the next round of darts. 

“Shoulders back. Feet wider apart.” Cass, who slouched perpetually, forced herself to stand up straight and adjusted her stance, pink high-tops grinding into the pavement. “Relax your fingers a bit.” 

This, technically, was how you threw knives, but knives and darts weren’t that different. Same general idea, right? Harley had hopped up onto the counter and Bruce’s head was in her lap, she was scratching behind his ears as he ate popcorn directly out of the bag. Helena had been eating popcorn out of that bag. God, Harley was gross. Cass chucked a dart, it hit the edge of one of the balloons and popped. 

“Good stuff, kid.” Renee’s slushie was lime-flavoured and it had coloured her lips and tongue a violent green, it made her look ridiculous but nobody was about to tell her that, and Cass gave her a bright blue grin in return. Was Helena’s mouth stained too? Harley’s was covered in the same glittery red lipstick she normally wore, but she wasn’t drinking a slushie, and Helena looked over to see if Dinah’s was red from the drink they were sharing. 

It was. Dinah’s lips were red and Helena wondered if they would taste of fake cherries, if they would be sweet against her own, if she’d be able to lick the flavour off Dinah’s mouth so she could taste Dinah beneath. Something hard and tight struck the middle of Helena’s chest, like there was a fist punching through her sternum, and she gripped the edge of the counter so hard her knuckles turned white. Jesus. Nope. Dinah was her friend. Apparently now her best friend, something Helena had never had before, and god she really needed to look up if wondering what your best friend’s mouth tasted like was normal. 

Another balloon popped and Helena realized Cass had managed to hit six of them while she had been daydreaming about Dinah’s lips, she had a single dart left and was looking at Helena expectantly. “Any tips?” 

“Snap your wrist.” Helena’s words came out a little bit higher in pitch than she had intended, her throat felt like it was closing like that time when she had eaten a peanut as a kid. (She had outgrown the allergy, thank god, but that feeling of panic as she had stopped being able to breathe had terrified her so much she hadn’t eaten peanut butter for another ten years). “Exhale as you throw.” 

Cass snapped her wrist and the dart hit the center balloon, pink rubber exploding into tiny pieces with a pop that made Helena flinch. Jesus Christ, how the fuck did Dinah manage to rattle her so much? She was the motherfucking Huntress, killer and ruthless revenge-seeker and all around hardass, and thinking about how it would feel to taste cherries on Dinah’s tongue had forced every other thought out of her head. 

If Dinah had noticed Helena’s gaze on her mouth, she didn’t show it, just brought the the straw to her lips and drank some more slushie. Cass was taking her prize of a stuffed pink monkey, Renee was pouring vodka into her cup, Harley was feeding Bruce more popcorn, and all Helena could think about was her and Dinah, tangled together on a bed like they had been this morning, but this time Dinah was kissing her, one hand gripping her hair, the other pressed into her waist, all soft lips and warm tongues and long legs and desperate teeth and ragged breaths and-

“Helena.” Renee flicked her in the ribs, pushing her sunglasses down her nose and eyeing Helena critically. Dinah and Harley and Cass and Bruce had gone ahead, Dinah holding both prizes, but Renee had stayed behind. “Come on.” 

Renee dragged Helena towards a bench across the path, it was rather like being yanked along by an angry second-grader, and sat her down on the bench with one hand wrapped around Helena’s shoulders in a gesture that would have been comforting if it wasn’t clearly designed to ensure Helena couldn’t bolt halfway through their conversation. 

“They’re going to get lost.” Helena picked at a bit of skin beside her thumbnail, she needed to talk to Renee anyways but she figured she might have a few days to write a script and practice it in the mirror. 

“They’re adults. They can manage.” At Helena’s raised eyebrow, Renee huffed a sigh and lifted her sunglasses onto the top of her head. Renee had very trustworthy eyes, which was a weird thing to notice, but it was one of the main reasons she had agreed to join and fund the Birds of Prey in the first place. “Alright, Dinah has Google Maps on her phone. She’ll figure it out. What’s going on, Bertinelli?” 

Renee only called her Bertinelli when she was in trouble. Fuck. Helena shrugged, staring very intently down at her nails so Renee’s hard eyes didn’t tear the truth out of her inch by fucking inch.   
“Nope. You don’t get to shrug at me. Use your words.” 

“How does it feel to have a best friend?” 

Clearly, not what Renee was expecting her to say. Renee frowned, her eyes narrowing, and sucked her teeth as she thought. “Nice, I guess.”

“No, like, what does it mean? To have a best friend?” 

“Uh. Well, I think it means you value that person a lot. You like being around them, they’re the first person you’d call if you got big news, you trust them with things you don’t tell anyone else.” 

“Okay.” Helena mulled that over for a moment. Like being around them, check. First person she’d call, check. Trust them with things, check. But what about cuddling? What about the feeling in Helena’s stomach when Dinah looked at her, about the way her smile felt like gazing into the sun, what about how Helena had just wondered how it would feel to kiss her? “Can I ask you a question?” 

“Shoot.” 

“Is it normal to want to kiss your best friend? Or feel like you’re about to pass out every time your best friend touches your hand? Or have your throat close up when your best friend smiles at you? Or think about her like, all the time, and have her laugh fill you with sunshine and rainbows and gross shit like that?” 

Renee looked at her for a long time. Too long. Oh, fuck, Helena had just ruined everything. She had just spilled her guts to Renee (not really, three sentences wasn’t really spilling your guts, but it was to Helena) and now Renee was going to laugh at her or make fun of her or tell her no, it was not normal, your feelings are all terrible and you should push them back into that weird place in the back of your mind where bad things live, you freak. 

“God, your childhood really fucked you up, huh?” Renee said finally, leaning back against the back of the bench and drinking more slushie. That was not exactly the answer Helena was looking for, the opposite, actually, and she wasn’t really sure what to do with that. Renee caught her frown and shook her head, stirring her drink with the thick blue straw. “Not an insult. I just never realized how much of life you missed out on.” 

“I didn’t miss out on life.” A lie, of course, Helena hadn’t graduated elementary school, she had never kissed anyone or slept with anyone or played a sport in school or made friends or gone to a dance or any of the bullshit in Renee’s movies, but she felt a little indignant nonetheless. 

“Really? Helena, have you had your first kiss yet?” 

“That’s not relevant right now. Is it normal or not?” 

Renee laughed, she could see right through Helena, because she could see through most people when she had hit that sweet spot on the Renee Montoya drunkenness scale (Dinah and Helena had come up with it a few months after they started working together, it was a multi-dimensional graph drawn on the whiteboard in Dinah’s kitchen that Renee erased whenever she could). God. Helena should have kept this to herself, she had dealt with these tangled feelings for a year by herself, she didn’t need any fucking help now, and Renee squeezed her shoulder before she could get up and leave. 

“Helena, my precious little baby gay. What you just described to me is a feeling called love.” 

Oh. 

_Oh._

Fuck. 

Nope. Renee was wrong. She had to be wrong, because Helena wasn’t in love with Dinah. She just liked smelling her hair and cuddling her and thought about kissing her a lot and started sweating every time Dinah got near her and felt tight in her chest whenever Dinah looked at her. That wasn’t love. That was...love. 

Oh, fuck. She was in love with Dinah. She, Helena Rosa Bertinelli, was in love with Dinah Laurel Lance. Oh god oh shit oh fuck. It made complete and total sense. That was why she felt so shaky and warm around Dinah, that was why Dinah’s smile lit up her world, that was why she lost her shit every time Dinah touched her. Because she loved her. Of course she did. 

This was not happening. This was not fucking happening. She could not be in love with Dinah. It wasn’t allowed. There had to be some sort of law against being in love with your best friend. A law or a clause or some legal shit that forbade you from wanting to kiss your best friend. Nope nope nope, this could not happen. It couldn’t. She couldn’t fuck up the closest friendship she had. She couldn’t ruin everything. 

“Helena.” Renee’s voice was gentler than normal (it was still hard and raspy, but a little nicer) and she ran a reassuring thumb over Helena’s shoulder. Helena realized, very suddenly, that she had leaned forwards and put her head in her hands, propping her elbows on her knees and staring at the sidewalk. “You’ve never loved someone before, have you?” 

Of course Helena hadn’t. When the fuck would she have had time to be in love with someone? She shook her head, face still buried in her hands, and groaned. God, she was fucking in love with Dinah. She was in love with the most incredible woman she’d ever met in her life and she hadn’t even realized it. How the fuck hadn’t she realized it? No, no, no, she couldn’t love Dinah. She couldn’t. It would end badly. 

“I can’t be in love with her.” Helena whispered, beating back her tears with the biggest stick her brain could conjure up. It worked well enough, she thought of how Luca told her crying made you weak, and sat up properly. “I can’t love her, Renee.” 

“Sure you can. You’re allowed to not be a hard-ass all the time, you know.” Renee cracked one of her knuckles, sunglasses sliding down another inch on her forehead, and Helena rubbed at her eyes so she didn’t cry in front of Renee. That would be the humiliating cherry on the embarrassment sundae. 

“No, I can’t. I can’t love her.” Helena probably sounded insane, but she was afraid and she had just been confronted with one of the hardest truths she’d ever had to face and she was probably going to be sick. “Everyone I have ever loved is dead. I won’t let that happen to her. I can’t.”

Renee stared at her. Stared so long Helena started to wonder if she had cotton candy or blood or slushie on her face, Renee was studying her with those dark, trustworthy eyes and then she did something really weird. She hugged Helena. Not for a long time, not too tight, but just enough. Renee had a strong hug and it was the first time Renee had ever hugged her, the first hug Helena had in fifteen years that wasn’t Cass, and it was oddly nice. 

“Helena, none of that was your fault. Your family didn’t die because you loved them.” 

“That doesn’t matter. What matters is that I loved them and they died in front of me and it fucking **destroyed** me. I was torn to fucking pieces and I have just started putting myself back together again and I can’t give anyone the power to ruin me again.” 

“Oh, Lena.” Renee hugged her again, which was weird, and called her Lena, which was extra weird, because Renee called her Crossbow Killer or Bertinelli or sometimes Helena, but not Lena. It was nice but god it was weird and she really hated pouring her heart out to Renee, but who else was she going to pour her heart out to? Harley was batshit, Cass was fourteen, Bruce was a fucking hyena, and Dinah was the reason she was pouring her heart out in the first place. “I need you to listen to me. Can you listen to me?” 

Helena nodded and Renee sighed, patting Helena on the shoulder. Clearly she hated this as much as Helena did, but at least Renee was willing to try. “No one you love died because of you. I promise you that. You loved them, and they died, and that fucking sucks. It sucks big time. But you can’t stop yourself from loving people because you’re afraid they’ll die on you. That’s stupid, and you are many things, Helena Bertinelli, but you aren’t stupid. Love is all we fucking have, Helena, and if you shut it out of your life, you are missing out. Don’t let your past ruin your future, alright? Not on my fucking watch.” 

It was the most words Helena had ever heard Renee say at one time, she was much more of a short-and-sweet (Renee was short, but she was not sweet) type of woman, and if Helena hadn’t already been sniffling she would have started. God, she was such a fucking sap. She hated being a sap. 

When Helena had stopped being a fucking mess, Renee held her out at arms length and licked her finger, wiping something off Helena’s cheek. Helena gagged and tried to pull away, she wasn’t a baby, and Renee held her steady as she rubbed at Helena’s face with her damp thumb. “Ew. You’re so fucking gross, get off.” 

“You have dirt on your face.” When Helena’s face was clean, Renee wiped her thumb on the collar of her jacket and squeezed her shoulder. There was a lot of shoulder squeezing going on here. “My point is, Dinah likes you too.” 

“ **That** was your point? God, you’re bad at this.” 

“Fuck you. Asking me all these dumb questions and shit and then you come up in here with your judgy ass and fucking insult me.” 

“Wait.” Helena said, wiping at her eyes. Thank god she wasn’t wearing makeup. “I didn’t say it was Dinah.” 

“Lena, Dinah has been hitting on you since the night we met. She makes moony eyes at you constantly, you’re literally wearing her underwear right now, and unless I was hallucinating, you two spent an hour slow-dancing in her living room and then cuddled all night. She could hop in your bed naked and propose marriage and you wouldn’t notice. Honestly, I deserve a fucking award for dealing with the two of you for a whole year. Cash prize or something.”

Dinah liked her? Oh, god, Helena hadn’t even considered the idea that Dinah might like her back. Like, not even a little. Hold on, Dinah had been flirting with her for a year? And she hadn’t noticed? Holy shit, she was stupid. So stupid. Renee was wrong, Helena was the dumbest woman alive. How the fuck had she not noticed Dinah flirting with her for a year? 

“What do I do?” Helena asked once she could breathe again. If she liked Dinah, and Dinah liked her, how did they go from there? Was there kissing involved? God, Helena hoped so. Renee offered Helena a sip from her flask, which Helena didn’t even think about before taking. “What did you do with Ellen?

“We fucked in her office twice a day for three months.” 

As it turned out, vodka did not taste as good trickling out of your nose as it did when you drank it. Helena wheezed, nostrils burning, and pounded on her chest until she had composed herself enough to speak. “Uh, maybe not that.” 

“I mean, it worked for us.” 

“No it didn’t. You guys have been on and off for like ten years.” 

“Oh my god, do you want advice or not?” 

“I want advice. Sorry.” 

“That’s what I thought. Lena, don’t wait. Waiting is awful and painful and you two have been waiting for a year now. Ask her out, kiss her, sleep with her, do whatever little freaks like you do, but just don’t wait.” 

Helena initiated the hug this time, which was weirder than Renee starting it, and Renee froze for a moment before hugging her back. They had probably been away for way too long, Helena couldn’t see Cass or Dinah or Harley or Bruce anywhere, and when they did stop hugging it was because Helena had started to get sweaty. 

“Renee?” Helena got up. She felt oddly light, as if the pressure of not knowing what she felt for Dinah had been lifted off her shoulders, and she was also fucking starving. Cass better have some of that cotton candy left. “I don’t know what I’d do without you. Thanks. You’re a really good friend.” 

“Yeah, I guess you’re not so bad yourself. I mean it, okay? Letting love into your life is hard, but it’s so fucking worth it.” Renee tucked her flask into her jacket and put her sunglasses back on, sliding her devil-may-care ex-cop mask back on with it. “If they’ve gotten another fucking animal, so help me god.” 

Helena grinned, slowing her pace so she and Renee were in step, and tipped her face up towards the sky. What a beautiful day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> dinah: let's make out
> 
> helena: like, as friends?


	8. vii: even bruce is tired of this sexual tension

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harley does, in fact, have a PhD, motherfucker. It is finally put to good use.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's three am and i'm a bit tired but i have decided to pretty much post as soon as i finish a chapter.

Helena had never thought of herself as a particularly good cook. Her parents had never taught her, they had always claimed she’d have people to do it for her, and Luca and Sal and Massimo taught her a few very basic recipes and called it a day. Luca and Sal were awful cooks, but she had watched Massimo cook sometimes and had always gaped at how easily he made beautiful meals for the four of them. She was good with a knife and very precise in most things she did, and she could cook about five things total. 

But Cass had asked her to cook for the five of them (her exact words were ‘You’re, like, Italian and I want pasta.’) and that was how Helena found herself standing in Renee’s kitchen, slicing tomatoes into even cubes and listening to Renee and Harley and Cass and Dinah talk over the reality show they were watching in the open living room. 

Renee had a nice house. It was at the edge of the city, two stories with an actual backyard and several bedrooms, and the living room floor was constantly covered in case files and papers and random boxes of ammo and photos. It probably drove Ellen insane when she came over, Helena had met Ellen several times and she was very, very high-strung. Helena could understand that, she was a messy person and Renee’s house still made her twitchy, but calling Renee out on it meant she’d just add more to the piles. 

“Wait, why is he giving them roses?” 

“When they get the rose, they get to stay another week. If they don’t get the rose, they have to go home.” 

“This is dumb.” Cass grumbled, leaning back on the couch. She wasn’t wrong, Helena hadn’t been paying attention at all but every single one of these women sounded painfully annoying. “Can we watch cartoons or something?” 

“No. Go help Helena in the kitchen if you’re bored.” Renee said, she and Dinah loved reality TV and Harley was probably more interested in the shiny colours on the screen than anything else. Helena only watched TV with Dinah and Renee, she had been allowed one episode of Topolino (the little mouse with the red shorts and the gloves) on weekends when she was a kid and Luca barely had electricity, let alone a TV, so it had never been something she sought out. Maybe she should. Not this show, though. This show was stupid. 

“Do you need help?” Cass asked as Helena cut a tomato in half, she had washed her hands before climbing up onto one of the stools across from her. Her lips were still a bit blue from the cotton candy earlier in the day, and her dragon sat on the couch beside Harley, while the monkey was being torn to shreds by Bruce in Renee’s backyard. 

“You want garlic bread?” Helena began to pick the seeds out, tomato seeds were revolting, and dropped them into the garbage. She could use the company more than anything, Helena had been thinking about how fucking oblivious she was to not notice that Dinah had been flirting with her for a year, and Cass was good company. Better company than replaying every single interaction she and Dinah had ever had to pull apart the meaning behind each word. Doing that while cutting tomatoes meant she’d probably lose a finger. “Great. Want to dice the garlic or slice the bread?” 

“Um, garlic.” Cass took the paring knife and chopping board Helena gave her, Renee owned more utensils and kitchen supplies than Dinah and Helena combined (Dinah had a single frying pan and Helena didn’t even own a toaster) and it was a lot easier to cook here than anywhere else. “You didn’t finish school, did you?” 

“Nah. I thought about picking up where I left off after Sionis, but the idea of being twenty-four in the fifth grade didn’t really appeal.” Helena poured olive oil into one of Renee’s pans, it wasn’t proper olive oil and Helena knew that it didn’t taste right, but she was mostly used to the bastardized American version of foods she had loved back in Sicily. 

“You’re twenty-four? You look older.” 

“Thanks, kid. Crush before you chop, alright? Better flavour.” 

Cass punched the garlic as hard as she could, which was not what Helena meant even a little. God, this kid. She was ridiculous, but she looked so pleased with herself that Helena laughed, adding several full cloves to the pan to brown. The noise hadn’t interrupted Dinah and Harley and Renee’s running commentary on the stupid show. 

“Where do you live?” Cass asked suddenly, beginning to cut the smushed garlic into tiny pieces. Not exactly the company Helena had in mind, but she was nothing if not adaptive, and she found a sieve in one of Renee’s cupboards and drained the tomatoes over the sink. 

“Gotham.” 

“Yeah, no shit. What neighbourhood?” 

“Same one as Dinah. Ten blocks over.” 

“I’ve never seen your apartment.” True, Helena didn’t like having people over and Cass coming over meant Harley and Bruce would come too, and her place was not big enough for a hyena and three people. It was barely big enough for two people. “Is it like, weird? Like a dungeon or something?” 

“No.” What vibes did she give off that she lived in a fucking dungeon? Just because she was anti-social and wore lots of black and looked sullen and didn’t like people coming over? Renee regularly asked if she lived in a dungeon or a basement and now Cass too? Rude. “It’s just small. And I don’t have a TV or a computer or anything fun there.” 

“You don’t have a TV?” Cass sounded like Helena had just said she didn’t have feet, or a pulse. She squashed another piece of garlic, this time with the heel of her hand, and frowned. “Why not?”

“I don’t know. I got one episode of cartoons a week when I was a kid and I never thought they were that interesting, I guess. My parents said that TV was bad for your eyes.” Helena shrugged, dumping the strained tomatoes into the pan alongside the garlic and opening Renee’s spice drawer. Renee’s spice drawer consisted of crushed red pepper, oregano, cumin, and basil in open containers and half a bottle of hot sauce that smelled like it had been around longer than Renee had been alive. Christ. 

“Well, which ones did you watch? Tom and Jerry? Looney Tunes? Scooby Doo?” Cass tilted her head, she and Harley were very passionate about their cartoons and Helena occasionally caught a glimpse of a cat, a rabbit, and a dog, but she liked to think she had better things to do than watch children’s cartoons (she didn’t, but she liked to think she did). 

“Um.” Helena stirred the tomatoes once, just enough to keep them from sticking. Renee’s blender was partly full of cheese and crushed almonds and basil and olive oil, it looked terrible without the tomatoes mixed in, like crumbly dirt, but it smelled fucking delicious. “I don’t know the English version but he’s called Topolino. The little mouse. He wore yellow shoes?” 

“Mickey Mouse? Oh, he’s not that good. I’ll make you a list of my favourites. Obviously Looney Tunes is a classic and the Road Runner too, and then you get into the old-school stuff like The Flintstones and the Smurfs, and—you’re staring at me.” Cass stopped herself, squinting at Helena with her _I don’t like the way you’re looking at me, punk_ face she had copied off Harley. She hadn’t meant to stare, but the idea that Cass cared enough about her and these cartoons to give her a list to watch made Helena’s heart warm. 

“Sorry. I’ve just never heard of any of those.” Helena dumped the tomatoes into the blender and waited until she could hear the dramatic music from the TV to flick it on, interrupting the climatic moment of the episode. Cass leaned over and gave her a fist bump, grinning, and Helena let the blender run until the commercials started playing. 

“Helena Bertinelli, I hope you die in a fire!” Renee yelled, turning around and pouring red wine all over her sleeve. Dinah laughed, gentle and lovely, and got to her feet, either to get more wine or a cloth for Renee or more snacks. “And now I spilled on my fucking shirt! Fuck you!” 

“You’re gonna get hair in my pasta.” Dinah leaned against the counter, crossing her arms over her chest as she watched Helena stir the pot of boiling pasta on the stove. It was doing spectacular things to her cleavage and every thing Helena was going to say in retort flew from her head as if they were being vacuumed out. Fuck. “Don’t move.” 

Helena stopped dead when she felt a pair of hands in her hair. Fucking hell, how had she managed to not realize that Dinah was flirting with her? What the fuck else was Dinah pulling her hair back supposed to be? Dinah’s fingers were soft and steady, moving along her scalp and the nape of her neck, braiding Helena’s hair loosely away from her face. God. What was that expression Cass liked to use? Worms for brains. Helena had worms for brains if she had managed to go a full year thinking that Dinah was being friendly. 

“Better. You’ve got great hair, but I don’t want it in my dinner.” Dinah tied the braid off with an elastic and ran a hand over Helena’s hair, her fingers lingering just above the collar of her shirt, and then she dropped her hand and took a sip of her wine. Cass, who had stopped buttering the bread and been making disgusted faces at them, turned back to garlic-buttering with a guilty expression on her face. One of these days, that kid was going to be the death of her. If the tension between Dinah and Helena didn’t kill Helena first. “What are you making? It smells fantastic.” 

Renee and Harley joined them, either lured in by the promise of dinner or the promise of wine, and Helena strained the fettucine. She didn’t need to check the doneness (knowledge of when pasta was cooked al dente was in her blood) and Renee started running her sleeve under the tap, doing way more harm than good. “Pesto and pasta and garlic bread.” 

“Pesto is green.” Harley said, dumping cutlery onto the dining room table. She started picking out clean forks and knives, none of which appeared to be from the same set. “That’s red.”

“Wow. No wonder you have a PhD.” Renee answered dryly, scrubbing at her sleeve in vain. Dinah snorted into her wine, still leaning against the counter, and Helena could feel Dinah’s gaze on her back as she stuck the garlic bread underneath the broiler. 

“Pesto rosso is red. It’s Sicilian.” 

“Is it good?” 

“I’m a little biased, Harley.” Helena spooned a quarter of the pesto into the pasta, just enough to keep it from getting clumpy. This meal was ten times better with fresh pasta, but Cass had whined about being hungry **now** and Renee didn’t own a pasta maker (none of them did, to be fair) so boxed stuff it was. “I think it’s good, but I made it.” 

“Everything you make is good.” Dinah said and Helena’s stomach twisted, so quickly and sharply it felt like a knife to the gut. She knew that Dinah liked her, if Renee was to be trusted, and she still felt like she was about to pass out whenever Dinah complimented her. Cass made a gagging noise and rolled her eyes, she had started helping Harley set the table because Harley was bad at it, and when Dinah glared at her Cass wisely returned to putting out forks and knives and plates. 

“We need to feed Bruce!” Harley gasped, like she’d forgotten about the massive hyena running around Renee’s backyard, and she grabbed Helena’s wrist. “There’s ground beef in the freezer. Can you get it and bring it outside with me?” 

“I guess. Renee, take the garlic bread out.” Helena opened Renee’s freezer and found a styrofoam tray of beef, it was frozen solid but Bruce had strong teeth. Why Harley needed help feeding Bruce was beyond her, Bruce didn’t even really like Helena, but she didn’t feel like arguing at this very moment so she followed Harley into the backyard. 

Bruce was sprawled in the shade, gnawing on the head of the monkey Cass had won with bits of stuffing and pink fur littered around like bones in a graveyard, if graveyard bones were pink and fluffy. He yawned, showing off pieces of the monkey stuck in his teeth, and padded over when he smelled the beef. 

“Have you and Dinah boned down yet?” Harley asked suddenly, opening the plastic-wrapped tray and beginning to feed it to Bruce. Fucking gross. Harley had no qualms about getting ground beef all over her fingers, which was disgusting, and Helena frowned. Bone down? What the fuck did that mean? 

“What’s bone down?” Helena tucked her hands into her pockets, she was still wearing Dinah’s jeans and Dinah’s shirt and they were the comfiest things Helena had ever worn in her life and she never wanted to take them off. What did her and Dinah have to do with bones? Why were the bones going down? 

“You know, muff-diving. Bumpin’ uglies. Has she taken you down to pound town?” Harley kept saying words, but Helena didn’t know what they meant. Muff-diving? Uglies? Pound town? What was Harley asking her? “Right, you don’t know anything. Have you and Dinah had sex?” 

Jesus. Couldn’t she just say sex? Why the weird metaphors? Also, that was not even a little bit of Harley’s business, but Harley had never been particularly tactful or respectful of the privacy of other people. “I, uh, we haven’t actually, you know…”

“You two haven’t kissed yet? Fucking hell! Why not?” Harley’s ability to deduce that from Helena’s clumsy mumbling was a testament to the fact that she was technically a doctor, Dr. Harleen Quinzel, PhD (Harleen Quinzel was possibly the most ridiculous name Helena had ever heard and it was way less probable as her actual name than just Harley Quinn). “Doll, she’s into you, you’re into her. Make a fucking move.” 

Wow, second time she’d been confronted with this today. Had Harley and Renee planned this? If either of them had ever planned anything in their lives, maybe, but since they were both very off-the-cuff people it was unlikely. Helena watched Bruce chew up the frozen hunks of beef, barfing words all over Harley. “I don’t know how. She’s so cool and so kind and I think she’s maybe the best person I’ve ever met, but every time she smiles at me I feel like I’m about to throw up. I’m weird and awkward and I have no game and I’ve never even kissed someone before. I have no experience with girls at all, like at all at all, and it just comes so easily to the rest of you, and I don’t know what-”

“Shh.” Harley put a bone-white finger on Helena’s lips, thankfully not the one that had been covered in raw beef juice, and patted Helena’s cheek with her other hand, which was the one covered in raw beef juice. “You are so cool. You’re like six feet tall and jacked as hell, you’ve got that whole goth-jock-lesbian thing going on, plus the fact that you’re gorgeous and rich and Italian and can kill men with your bare hands. Who cares that you’re a repressed virgin? Dinah isn’t going to stop liking you because you’re a little awkward.” 

It was a very nice thing to say, despite the fact that Harley was getting raw meat all over her face, and Helena removed Harley’s hand from her cheek before giving her a very stilted hug. She didn’t really know what to do with her arms, but Harley squeezed her tight and fed Bruce the rest of the ground beef with her free hand. “Just so you know, if you guys don’t start making out soon Cass and I are going to lock you in a closet together and not let you out until you kiss. I’ll be your wingwoman! Oh, I’m great at being a wingwoman. You know, it was me who introduced-?” 

“Yeah, yeah.” Helena sat down on the step of the porch, scratching Bruce behind the ears as he meandered over to put his head in her lap. She didn’t know what a wingwoman was, but it couldn’t be a good thing. “I’ll be inside in a minute. Pour me some wine.” 

“Yes, chef.” Harley saluted and marched back inside, leaving Helena alone with her thoughts and a very large animal. Bruce yawned, he fucking reeked of grass and beef and something vaguely salty, probably the popcorn Harley had fed him earlier, and shut his eyes. He was going to be mad when she stood up in a minute, but for now, she was content to shut her own eyes and let Bruce doze in her lap, the memory of her mother washing over her like a cold bath she didn’t want to have.   
_  
“Mamma, do you love Babbo?” Helena asks, pushing a Hot Wheel across the floor towards Pino. She and her brother sit on opposite sides of their parents’ bedroom, Pino is making a line of cars and shoving them one by one towards Helena, who is sending them back gently. Their mamma and babbo are both getting ready in front of their vanities, they are going to a dinner that Helena and Pino are not invited to. Helena has just turned eight and Pino is five, they are too old to be toted around like accessories and too young to be trusted to behave, though Helena is painfully polite and Pino can normally hush for an evening._

_“Of course I do, passerotta.” Maria puts in a teardrop diamond earring. Franco is removing the grey hairs from his mustache one by one, Helena’s father is meticulous about his appearance and he believes that anything less than perfection is unacceptable. Helena gets up, making Pino whine, and walks over to her father, watching herself in the mirror in front of them._

_“Babbo, do you love Mamma?” She examines her father. Helena has always resembled her mother more than her father, but Helena and Franco share the same sharp nose and pointed chin, the two of them and Pino all have eyes so dark they’re nearly black while her mother’s eyes are a paler brown._

_“Very much.” Franco lifts Helena onto his lap, setting down his tweezers as he settles his daughter on his knee. He smells of cigar smoke and cologne, a smell Helena has always associated with her father, and Helena smiles at him in the mirror. “You and your mother are the most important girls in my life, little dove. I love you both more than life.”_

_“And me, babbo?” Pino crawls onto Franco’s other knee, a toy car in each fist and a few more shoved in the pockets of his pants. Franco laughs, kissing his only son on the top of the head, and hugs both his children close to his chest._

_“You, mi patatino, are the most important boy in my life.” Maria joins them, resting a hand on her husband’s shoulder, and for a moment they look at themselves in the mirror. Helena and Pino on their father’s knees, Maria at Franco’s side, the Bertinelli family make a very handsome picture. “There is nothing I would not do for the three of you. My beautiful wife, my beautiful daughter, my handsome son. I am so blessed.”_

_“When I grow up, will I have this?” Helena lets her mother run a hand over her straight dark hair, the gold-and-opal wedding ring on her finger catching the light. She has always wondered what she will have when she is the head of the Bertinellis, if she will marry a strong man and have strong children and have a life that is blessed like her father’s._

_“When you grow up, little dove, you will have everything. We will pick you a good husband and you will have handsome children with him and you will be the most powerful woman in Gotham City. The world will be at your feet and you will have a husband and children to share it with.” Franco kisses his daughter’s head now, the faint lines around his eyes and mouth deepening with his smile. Helena’s mother has no lines, but she is younger than Helena’s father by several years and uses strange creams and lotions on her face that Helena is not allowed to play with. “Your brother will be your second like my brother was mine, and you will make me and your nannu and your catanannu very, very proud of you.”_

Helena didn’t think her father or her grandfather or her great-grandfather would be particularly proud of the path she had forged, of the life she had carved out of blood and sweat and tears and smoke, of the family she had found for herself after hers had been ripped away by the barrel of a gun. She had become a woman twisted with rage and hate and pain, a woman shattered and duct-taped back together, a woman who did not deserve Dinah Lance. 

The life she had thought she wanted would not have involved Dinah. It would have involved the son of one of her parents’ allies, a tall burly man with thick dark hair and thick gold watches who smelled like her father, a man with a name like Vinny or Rocco or Antonio, dating for one year, engaged for one year, a formal wedding in the Church of Our Lady of Grace, two or three children conceived during dull sweaty sex Helena didn’t enjoy, children with thick dark hair and hard dark eyes and the middle names of Maria and Franco, a life that she would have endured because she wanted to make her parents happy. 

But the life she had now did involve Dinah. It involved Dinah and Renee and Harley and Cass, and though she’d never admit it, it included the snoring hyena in her lap. It was a life she had never imagined for herself and a life she was so very grateful to have. Helena combed her fingers through Bruce’s fur, running her nails against his spine, and smiled when he growled contentedly. God, she was so fucking lucky, and she’d be even luckier if her family had remembered to save her any pasta. 

Turned out, making dinner meant that Helena didn’t have to do dishes. Instead she sat at the counter, tracing the rim of her wine glass with a finger and watching Dinah and Renee load Renee’s dishwasher. Cass was dozing on the couch, full of pasta and the jelly beans she had eaten for dessert, and Harley sat beside Helena, sorting a handful of jelly beans by colour. 

“That was like, the worst date I’ve ever seen.” Renee said, rinsing the last plate off in the sink before putting it into the dishwasher. She was a bottle of wine deep, which meant it was Renee’s opinion o’clock, and Dinah rolled her eyes. “I’m serious. I’ve been on some bad dates, and watching those two stupid-ass white people ride horses and talk about their fucking feelings was pathetic.” 

“Really? What’s the worst date you’ve ever been on, then?” Dinah put a layer of plastic wrap on the leftovers and tucked them into the fridge, getting up on her toes to reach the very top shelf. Helena watched her do it, eyes lingering on the smooth brown skin of Dinah’s lower back. God, she was useless. How did the small of Dinah’s back make her suddenly aware of every single pore on her body, like she had just been electrocuted or struck by lightning or something? Dumbass of the fucking century. 

“I was twenty-two. We went to-” 

“Dinosaur racing? A meeting to discuss Pangea? To kill some more tigers so you could make clothes out of their fur?” 

Helena, who did not know what Pangea (or if she was being totally honest, what a dinosaur) was, laughed. She took the jelly bean Harley gave her, a purple one, and put it in her mouth, where it tasted fucking terrible mixed with white wine. Harley only gave her purple jelly beans, she was picking out the yellow ones for Dinah and blue ones for Renee and there was a pile of pink and white for her and Cass, and Helena didn’t hate the blackberry flavour. 

“Fuck you. We went to a bar, he puked in my purse, and tried to get me to go home with him. He also forgot his wallet so I had to pay his seventy-dollar bill. It was fucking terrible.” 

“That’s nothing.” Dinah curled her fingers around Helena’s glass of wine and took a sip, her lips curving upwards in a half-smile. Helena wondered, briefly, how it would feel to have that perfect mouth against her neck, against her chest, everywhere and anywhere and all over her skin. “I once went on a date with a guy I met online. I thought he was sorta cute, in, like, a gangster way, he had a bunch of tattoos and a shaved head and we went for a drink. First of all, he was half an hour late, which was annoying as shit. So he finally walks in, I’m pissed as hell, and he sits down, takes a huge gulp of my drink, and I see he has no teeth. Like, none at all. Not even a fucking back molar.”

For the second time that day, Helena snorted alcohol out of her nose. Holy shit. She coughed violently, doing her best not to spew wine all over the counter, and Harley thumped her on the back twice. Jesus fucking Christ. All of them were laughing, if Cass didn’t sleep like she’d just been knocked unconscious they might have woken her up, even Renee was howling, and this was the fucking life. Laughing with her friends, her family, these people who cared for her and who she cared for. It was so nice. The nicest thing she’d ever felt (besides Dinah’s cuddles, but that was a different kind of feeling).

“You win.” Renee wheezed, bracing a hand on the counter so she didn’t fall over. “God, you totally win. What did you do?” 

“Said I had to run to the washroom and left. I don’t care if you have no teeth, I care that you’re upfront about it, you know?” Dinah had stolen Helena’s wine completely, wandering away with the drink cupped in one hand. Her rings clinked against the glass, gold and pretty, and her fingers were long with short nails and calluses that had felt so nice when they touched Helena’s skin. “I blocked his number and ran like hell.”

“Helena, you ever been on a date?” Harley asked, in what Helena assumed Harley believed to be good wingwoman-ing. God. Abort fucking mission. 

“Never had the time.” Helena took a yellow jelly bean out of Dinah’s pile and bit it in half, she had always thought jelly beans were way too sweet but the lemon flavour was almost tolerable, and ate the other half as she kept going. “Not a huge gay scene in remote Sicily, oddly enough.” 

“Weird. Can I take you out on a date, then? I’ve been told I’m excellent at dates.” Harley winked very unsubtly at Helena, who was contemplating climbing out of Renee’s window to avoid this conversation. What exactly did Harley think she was doing?

“No.” Dinah’s voice had risen an octave, she had stopped dead in the middle of the kitchen and her eyes were hard as she glared at Harley. “Your version of a date probably involves a shitton of cocaine and a baseball bat.” 

“That’s not a bad thing.” Harley sounded cheerful, she was completely ignoring Renee’s narrowed eyes and the fact that Dinah looked like she was about to pop a blood vessel. “But if you have a problem with how I would wine and dine our lovely Crossbow Killer, why don’t you take her date virginity?” 

“Don’t call it that.” Renee and Helena said at the same time, Jesus Christ Harley phrased things terribly, but Harley waved them off. She leaned forwards on her elbows, and Helena realized she was trying to goad Dinah into asking Helena out. What a genuinely terrible idea. Harley raised an eyebrow, there was a rhinestone stuck to her left temple and glitter smeared on her eyelid and Dinah looked like she was about to punch the smudged lipstick off Harley’s smirking mouth. 

“Helena, how’s tomorrow at eight work for your busy schedule?” Dinah turned to Helena, she looked actually angry, and it was doing something very weird to Helena’s stomach that she didn't have the time to puzzle out at that exact second. Wow. Well, as terrible of an idea as that was, it worked. Maybe Harley was an excellent wingwoman. “I know a really good Thai place downtown.” 

“Yes.” Helena said, more forcefully than she’d meant to, and swallowed hard as she attempted to backtrack. “I mean, I’d rather not snort a bunch of coke and whale on some strangers with a bat, and I like Thai.” 

Helena had never eaten Thai food in her life, but who the fuck cared. Dinah had just asked her out. Like, on a real date. On a proper date, and they liked each other, Helena was pretty sure, and they were going on a date. Holy shit. 

“Great. Glad I have the honour of taking your date virginity.” Dinah finished the last bit of wine, leaving brown lipstick on the rim, and Helena did enjoy the word virginity coming out of Dinah’s wonderful, wonderful mouth. “I’ll pick you up. Wear something that shows off your muscles.” 

“And after you take her date virginity, you can take her reg-” 

Helena kicked Harley in the calf as hard as she could, if she had been wearing her regular boots she might have cracked bone, but all her kick managed to do was shut Harley up. That had been the point, so it worked, and Helena shot Harley a look that could have melted her face off. Wingwoman time was over. The details of her sexual history (or rather lack thereof) did not need to be exposed at seven-thirty on a Saturday night while they were all a bit drunk. 

“Well, I’m so happy that’s settled. Can we get back to our show? I want to see what happens.” Renee clapped her hands together, breaking whatever strange tension had settled over Helena and Harley and Dinah, and poured herself more wine. “Don’t wake the kid.” 

Helena sat down between Harley and Cass, if she sat next to Dinah she might be genuinely sick, and Harley flashed a bright grin. She elbowed Helena in the ribs, God her elbows were bony, and winked again. “You are very welcome, Crossbow Killer.” 

“I’m going to kill you slowly, Harley Quinn, and feed you to Bruce.” 

“You’re so funny.” 

“I wasn’t kidding.” 

“See? You’re just the funniest ex-mafia princess who owes me a _very_ big favour.” Harley smiled, and even though Helena knew she was joking, she really did owe Harley one. Like, a really big one, actually asking Dinah out would have taken Helena at least another six months and Harley had managed to get Dinah to ask Helena out in less than half a minute. “Now, hush. I want to see who wins.” 

“No one wins the Bachelor, Harley.” That was Dinah, who had settled herself on the sectional on Cass’ other side and propped her feet on the coffee table. “Every single one of these girls, no matter how they place, will end up shilling Sugar Bear Hair gummies and Fit Tea promo codes on unverified Instagram accounts until they die.” 

That was a lot of words Helena didn’t know in a single sentence. She made a mental note to ask Cass what all of them meant later, but for right then, Helena took a sip of Harley’s wine and wondered what she had done in a past life to deserve the one she had right now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> helena loses a brain cell every time dinah touches her. currently she's at negative fifty-three.


	9. viii: okay but like do you like-like me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> helena: i'm lesban  
> helena: lezian  
> helena: lessbean  
> dinah: take your time  
> helena: girls

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my classes got cancelled for three weeks so uh expect much more frequent updates

“Why don’t you have any nice panties?” 

“Will you stop going through my fucking underwear drawer, please?” 

“I would stop if you had sexy underwear. Boxers are gonna be kinda hard for Dinah to take off with her teeth.” 

“Oh my fucking god, there is a kid here. Could we not have this conversation right now?” 

Harley looked up from Helena’s underwear drawer, a pair of boxer briefs in one hand and one of Helena’s sports bras in the other. God, Harley sucked. Cass was lying on Helena’s couch, rolling a quarter over her knuckles, and Helena had been trying to get dressed for the past twenty-five minutes. Harley was not helping. 

“It’s fine. You know what underwear is, right kid?” 

“That isn’t the point.” 

“I’m not listening, anyways.” Cass flipped the coin to her other hand and looked up at Helena, a bright grin on her face that made it clear she was, in fact, listening. “Wear the jeans with no rips and the grey shirt.” 

“Are you sure?” Helena, standing beside her bed in a towel, asked, examining the three outfits Harley had laid out on her comforter. She had been eating antacids all day, if she threw up it might just be sticks of chalk, and there was a hole in the inside of her cheek where she had been chewing on it since she’d woken up. Harley and Cass had shown up a few hours ago, Helena was fairly certain they had followed her home last night, and Harley had bust in like she owned the place and started going through Helena’s clothes. 

“Yeah, dude. Dinah likes how your butt looks in those jeans.” Cass shrugged, pushing herself up off the couch and walking over to Helena’s kitchen. “Do you have anything good to eat?” 

“There’s fluff in the fridge.” Helena, who thought the idea of eating marshmallow fluff was fucking disgusting, had picked up a few things for Cass on her grocery trip, the kid tore through snacks quicker than Bruce, which was why there was a jar of fluff and a package of something called Oreos and a bright red bag of cheese-flavoured chips she figured Cass might like. “Wait, she likes my butt?” 

The idea that Dinah liked her was still so foreign, so strange, that it didn’t even occur to Helena that Dinah might have looked at her the way she looks at Dinah, eyes lingering on necks and stomachs and backs, on the hard muscle of a thigh or the length of a neck. Dinah liked her butt? Helena grinned. 

“Well, if she doesn’t like it, she sure as hell spends a lot of time staring at it.” Harley tossed Helena a pair of boxers, the nicest ones she owned, and dipped her finger into the jar of fluff. Good thing Helena didn’t eat it, because she was fairly certain Harley had never washed her hands in her entire life. “And that shirt does fucking wonders for your arms.” 

It did. It was a sleeveless turtleneck that shoved off an inch or two of her abs, Dinah had picked it out, and the jeans were tight and black and clung to her hips like a second skin. Helena flexed, the fresh tattoo on her bicep moving, and she had to admit her arms did look good in this shirt. Would it be weird to do some push-ups to really get her muscles popping? Probably. She did her jeans up carefully, examining the scar just barely poking out from beneath her shirt. Dinah had taken out the stitches yesterday and she had been left with a line of rough pink skin beneath her navel. 

“You look hot.” Harley licked the fluff off her fingers, Cass had actually bothered with a spoon, and raked her jagged gaze down Helena’s body in a way that Helena would have enjoyed if it had come from literally anyone but Harley. It wasn’t like Harley wasn’t attractive, because she was, in a janky clown sort of way, all white skin and manic smiles and glittery makeup, but Helena had eyes for one person and it was not Harley. “I’m almost mad Dinah didn’t let me take you on a date, doll.” 

“Gross.” Cass said through a mouthful of sugary garbage, bits of white goop stuck to her lips, and swallowed hard. “I never want to have crushes on people. You guys act so dumb around each other.” 

“Oh, my beautiful young grasshopper, someday you’ll act all gooey and stupid around people you care about. It’s part of growing up.” Harley pressed a sticky kiss to the top of Cass’ head, probably leaving fluff in her hair, and grinned at Helena. “What shoes are you gonna wear?” 

“Tough call between the boots, the boots, or the running shoes.” Helena owned three pairs of shoes, a pair of brown leather boots, a pair of black leather boots, and white sneakers Luca had bought her before she left for Gotham that she wore on the occasional jog. She didn’t really need any other shoes, Helena didn’t do much that required heels or any of the flashy footwear Harley preferred. So she stuck with black boots with metal to break toes easier, brown boots for everyday wear, and sneakers when she went on runs. 

Harley clicked her tongue, scrutinizing the three options she’d been given. If Harley had her way, Helena would probably be wearing a sparkly pink shirt and fluorescent-striped pants and mismatched heels, but while Helena was willing to compromise on a lot when it came to Harley, she was not going to fuck up her very first date ever, by letting Harley dress her. “Brown ones. Gives you that sexy huntsman look.” 

Helena laced the brown boots up tightly, making sure they were secure on her feet, and Harley gave her a thumbs-up before reaching into her bra and pulling out five bucks. “Kid, can you go to the bodega around the corner and get us some chips? If we’re going to hang out at Helena’s all night, I need more snacks.” 

“Why are you hanging out in my home all night?” Helena asked, sitting down on the couch and checking her phone. Dinah was picking her up in twenty minutes and she really did not need Harley and Cass at her apartment while she was out. Cass was fine, she’d just watch TV on her phone and order a pizza or something, but leaving Harley at her place meant she might come home to a burned-down building. Cass shut the door behind her and as soon as she was gone Harley flung herself onto the couch beside Helena and crossed her legs. 

“Oh, I just needed the kid out for this talk. Helena, do you know what sex is?” 

“Jesus Christ.” Helena groaned, pushing some hair out of her face. Was Harley trying to give her a sex talk? She had never gotten one, of course she hadn’t, the singular time she’d asked her mother about sex after hearing the word at school Maria waved her away, telling her she’d learn when she was married, and she was fairly certain Luca and Sal and Massimo would have rather remove their own eyes with rusty spoons than be forced to give her a sex talk. “I think I’ve got the general idea, yeah.” 

She didn’t, really. Helena’s knowledge of sex was that it was something grown-ups did after they were married, never before, and that according to the nine movies she’d seen in her life, you smoked a cigarette afterwards. If Dinah kissed her, she wouldn’t know where to put her hands, what to do with her hips or her mouth or her legs, how to not have a panic attack if she saw Dinah even slightly undressed. What would she do if Dinah kissed her, if Dinah slid her fingers beneath Helena’s shirt or into the waist of her jeans, if Dinah undid the button of her pants and slid them down her thighs and touched her between them? Cry, probably. Maybe vomit. 

“The general idea? What the fuck’s that supposed to mean? You ever seen a movie with sex? Or like, porn or something?” Harley tapped Helena’s knee, her fingers long and skinny and dirty against Helena’s clean pants, and when Helena made eye contact she found actual concern in Harley’s eyes, something normally reserved for Cass and occasionally Bruce. “If you ask me what porn is, I’m gonna flip.” 

Helena, who had been about to ask what porn was, pressed her lips together tightly. Based on context, she assumed it had something to do with sex, pictures or videos or something, but as to the actual contents she had no clue. “I think I’ll figure it out, Harley, but thanks.” 

Oh, Jesus, she hadn’t even considered the idea that she and Dinah might have sex that night. It had been in her mind, obviously (and the subject of a very pleasant dream she’d had during a nap that day), but she hadn’t even thought that it might have been that night. Oh god, oh fuck, oh god. Even the thought was making her heart beat quicker, how was she going to manage the real thing if just thinking about Dinah made her hands shake? 

“Don’t do anything you ain’t comfortable with, Crossbow Killer. Dinah’s like balls-deep in love with you and she’s been ready to jump your bones since you stabbed that dude to death in the tunnel, and I wanna be sure you’re all good with whatever you two are gonna do. Use your words, alrighty? Tell her how you feel and tell her if it’s too much. Don’t do that thing you do where you’re uncomfortable but won’t say anything because you think it makes you look weak.”

Helena hadn’t thought Harley actually cared enough to tell her this stuff, or cared enough to notice these things about her. It was a very weird feeling to know Harley had recognized that she refused to admit when she was uncomfortable and was calling her out on it, even weirder to know that Harley cared about how she felt and especially how she felt when it came to sex. Helena didn’t know why Dinah would want to jump on her bones (to break them like Harley liked to stomp on people’s knees?) but she knew that she was willing to take everything Dinah was willing to give. 

“I won’t.” Helena stuck out her pinky. Cass made her pinky promise often, and she figured Harley knew what a pinky promise was. She had to, she hadn’t been isolated her entire life. Harley folded her smallest finger around Helena’s and left a streak of marshmallow fluff on Helena’s hand. Fuck. 

“Good. Go brush your teeth.” Harley smacked Helena’s thigh, hard, and Helena didn’t really want to unpack why, exactly, it made something twist in her stomach, so she went to go brush her teeth. She brushed her teeth and scrubbed her tongue and flossed, something she never did because Helena had stopped going to the dentist when she was eight. She probably had a shocking amount of gum disease, but her teeth were straight and white and hadn’t started falling out of her mouth yet. 

Helena ran a comb through her hair, parting it as neatly as she could on one side and trying to make sure it wasn’t too messy. Her mother had always fussed over her hair, Helena had very thick, very dark hair and her mother had spent hours brushing it, braiding it, putting small white and blue clips in it, and when she had moved Luca and Massimo and Sal had no idea how to deal with it. She’d cut her own hair off when she was ten and had kept it at the same length ever since, just below her chin and she cut it once a month over the sink. 

She hadn’t bothered to put makeup on, just washed her face and applied a tiny bit of vanilla-flavoured chapstick Harley had given her. Helena had begun to divide her life as best as she could when it came to appearance; there was Huntress, who wore blue and black tracksuits and a mask and a lot of dark eyeshadow, and then there was Helena, who wore grey sweaters and loose jeans and kept her face bare. Huntress was cool, collected, bad-ass; Helena was quiet and nervous and awkward. Huntress was a fucking gymnast; Helena regularly tripped down flights of stairs.

“Let’s see!” Harley yelled, which felt unnecessary considering Helena didn’t have a bathroom door and Harley was less than six feet away from her, and Helena ran a final hand over her hair. She looked...pretty. Well, not pretty, Helena had never considered herself particularly attractive, but she supposed that like this, clean and well-dressed and smiling (smiling?), she looked nice. Almost lovely. 

“Well, I hope you’re ready for Dinah to have your children.” Harley wolf-whistled, she had draped herself all over Helena’s couch and seemed to have dipped her entire hand into the jar of fluff to lick it off. Helena really didn’t want to get a new couch, but bits of marshmallow had already smeared one cushion and Harley was working on the second. Fuck. 

“I don’t think that’s how it works.”

“It’s a figure of speech, doll. You look sexy.” 

Huh. Helena slid her phone into her back pocket, Dinah was supposed to be picking her up in five minutes, and she was going to be sick. What if she was terrible at this? What if Dinah took one look at her and laughed? What if she was awful at dates and Dinah never spoke to her again? What if Dinah was doing this in a friendship way and she was staring at Helena’s butt in a friendly, platonic way? What if Renee and Harley were wrong? 

“In through your nose.” Harley said, sucking fluff from her middle finger fairly aggressively. “Out through your mouth. This is a natural biological response to being nervous.” 

“Thank you, Doctor Quinzel.” Helena took a deep breath through her nose and let it out through her mouth, patting her pockets to make sure she had everything. Keys, wallet, phone, chapstick, a handful of coins for the parking meter. She didn’t need anything else, did she? What did people bring on first dates? No. Stop overthinking, Bertinelli.   
Dinah liked her, Helena thought, taking another breath through her nose. Dinah liked her and Dinah was going to take her on a date. They were going to go out for dinner and then after they might drive around or hang out for a while or kiss. All three might be nice. Dinah liked her, she reminded herself as two sharp taps came from her front door, and she liked Dinah. Nothing to be worried about. 

“Go get ‘em, tiger.” Harley started in on her ring finger, coated all the way to the knuckle in fluff, and gave Helena an encouraging grin. “You got this. Be yourself but just like, a little bit less awkward. Open doors for her. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.” 

“If I’m doing what you don’t, then I’ll make good choices.” Helena pulled her jacket on, brown leather with a pack of mints and some gum in the pockets, and leaned over to kiss Harley on the top of the head before she could overthink it. Harley’s hair smelled like bubblegum and when Helena straightened up, running a hand through her hair and probably messing it up again, Harley looked almost pleased with herself. “Thanks. If you’re still here when I get home, I’m kicking your ass.” 

“Oh, you love me. Go answer the door.” Harley waved her off with a fluff-covered hand, licking goop off her fingernails. Helena took another deep, deep breath and took the chain off the door before unlocking it and yanking it open. 

Dinah leaned against the doorframe, one hand shoved in her pocket and the other twisting a single red rose. She wore dark blue pants and a gold shirt that looked like it was painted on, long-sleeved and cropped high above her navel, her feet shoved into gold heeled boots and her lips painted a red so flawless Helena could feel her heart skip in her chest. God, she was the most beautiful woman Helena had ever seen, the most beautiful woman to ever exist, and she was smiling at Helena with those perfect dimples and Helena really might drop dead. Could you die because someone was so beautiful? Maybe. 

“Hey.” Dinah held out the rose, pushing herself off the door and looking Helena up and down once. It was the same way Harley had looked at her, sharp and hungry, but there was a genuine kindness in Dinah’s eyes that Harley didn’t have. No one did. Dinah was so unwaveringly, unflinchingly kind, she believed in kindness beyond everything, that without caring for people you couldn’t live properly, and it was one of so very many things that Helena adored about her. “You look amazing. This is for you.” 

Helena took the rose, the thorns had been cut off the stem and it was bright red, the colour of Dinah’s mouth, and smiled so broadly her cheeks hurt. “Thank you. I, uh, you look really good too.” 

“Thanks.” Dinah said, jerking her chin at Harley, who had come up behind Helena with her pinky now jammed in her mouth. “Hey, Harley. You eating all of Helena’s food?” 

“Nah.” Harley showed off glued-together teeth, plucking the rose from Helena’s grip and turning it over in her clean hand. Dinah rolled her eyes at Helena, like it was an inside joke they shared, and remained in the doorway. “I’ll put this in water. Have her home by midnight, Canary, and I want her back with her hymen completely intact, understand me?” 

“Je-sus.” Dinah dragged out the word an extra few syllables, pulling a face at Harley. Helena didn’t know what a hymen was, but based solely on the fact that Dinah looked genuinely disgusted, it likely had something to do with sex. Why was Harley so fucking interested in them having sex? Concern or her being a freak as always? Both, probably. “You’re a pervert. Tell Cass I say hi.” 

“Sure. Have fun, you two. Keep it above the belt.” Harley nudged Helena out the door and shut the door behind them. Had Helena just been kicked out of her own home? Of course she had. Dinah sighed, but she didn’t sound actually annoyed, her eyes were bright and clear and she was still smiling. Her smile lit up Helena’s entire life, nothing she’d ever seen had ever compared to the curve of Dinah’s lips when she looked at Helena. She had thought this was friendship? Worms for brains (Helena had grown weirdly attached to the phrase and had started to piss Cass off by saying it.)

“Did she come to help you get ready?” Dinah asked as they started down the stairs, nudging Helena with a shoulder. The stairs weren’t really wide enough for them to walk down side-by-side, but they did anyways, Helena was not quite hanging over the banister and she didn’t really care as long as Dinah’s arm kept brushing her side. 

“If you consider going through my underwear drawer and yelling a lot helpful, then yes.” Helena opened the door at the bottom of the stairs, remembering that Harley had told her to do it, and let Dinah go first. Dinah’s convertible sat by the curb, it was less than a year old and painted the same pale yellow as the one Harley had stolen and wrapped around a telephone pole less than a week later. Dinah had raged for nearly a month after Harley crashed her car, but with her share of the Bertinelli fortune, she had bought a new one and still refused to let Harley near it. 

Dinah laughed, opening the passenger door for Helena before circling the car to climb in the driver’s side. Half a pack of cigarettes, a tube of lipgloss, three plastic lighters, and a switchblade sat in the cupholders, a pair of dice dangled from the mirror, and a parking ticket was jammed beneath the windshield wiper. It was a perfect car, obviously. “I wouldn’t say that’s particularly helpful, but I hope she picked out something nice.” 

Oh, fuck, Dinah had just referenced her underwear. Helena did up her seat belt, cheeks burning, and Dinah laughed again, bright and cheerful, before buckling her own seat belt and jamming her keys into the ignition. “Anyone ever tell you you’re cute when you blush?” 

“You’re the only person who’s ever seen me blush.” 

“Well, lucky me, ‘cause it’s fucking adorable.” 

Helena was going to have an aneurysm. She tapped her fingers on her knee, begging her body to chill the fuck out, and stopped breathing entirely when Dinah rested her hand on Helena’s headrest so she could pull out of her parking space. Dinah’s fingers were so close to her shoulder, if Helena exhaled they’d be touching, and she held her breath until Dinah had pulled away from the curb and put her other hand back on the steering wheel. God, how did Dinah make such mundane things look so fucking good? She was just driving, her bottom lip between her teeth and her fingers drumming a restless beat on the horn as they sat in traffic, but every single thing Dinah did made Helena’s heart feel like it was about to beat right out of her chest.

“You ever had Thai food?” Dinah changed lanes, the muted pink and purple and orange of the setting sun painting her face in shafts of light. She was a fucking masterpiece, an angel brought down to Earth, and if this was a dream Helena didn’t want to ever wake up. 

“Never.” Helena folded her hands in her lap so she wouldn’t reach for Dinah, so she wouldn’t cup her face or touch her arm or take her hand. She ate mostly the same thing every day, plain fruits and chicken and vegetables and the occasional protein bar, sometimes pasta, sometimes pizza, not much else. Helena had never enjoyed American food, she thought it was way too heavy and way too sugary and none of it was any good, really. Dinah and Cass and Harley and Renee occasionally talked her into eating brightly-coloured circles with a bird on the box or weird pastries full of jam she couldn’t remember the name of. Helena didn’t hate the loops but the jam things were disgusting. 

“Glad I get to show it to you, then. I fucking love Thai food.” Dinah took a hand off the wheel and for a moment it seemed like she was going to put a hand on Helena’s leg, gold rings gleaming in the waning light, and her hand lingered between them, long and graceful and warm and perfect. She looked over at Helena, eyes wide in silent question, and Helena forced herself to breathe. In and out. 

Helena nodded and Dinah ran a thumb over the inside of Helena’s knee, keeping her eyes on the road as she began to draw slow, steady circles on Helena’s leg. Neither of them acknowledged the touch beyond what was necessary, as if speaking it aloud would ruin the intimacy, but Helena could feel her pulse hammering as Dinah drove with one hand and thumbed patterns onto her leg with the other. 

She was going to have a panic attack. Or something. Helena had never actually had a panic attack before, Luca didn’t believe they were real and while she had never agreed with him, there were some points that were not to be pressed with cranky old Italian men and the legitimacy of panic attacks was one of them. She had been panicked before, Helena had been panicking since she was nine years old, but she felt like she was about to keel over and die. Was this a panic attack? What was a panic attack, even? She was about to find out. 

“Hey.” Dinah said softly, her fingers stilling on Helena’s leg. She had parked outside a small restaurant with no sign in the window and was looking at Helena with her perfect eyes, dark and striking and lined with black. Helena met her gaze. She had never felt anything like this in her entire life, liquid warmth in the pit of her stomach, like she had just drank too much tea too quickly. She normally felt something like this around Dinah, something hot and strange knotting around her ribs, but this was new and it was terrifying. “You gotta tell me if this is too much, alright? I can understand your body language pretty well by now, but I can’t magically read your thoughts.” 

“You don’t want to know my thoughts.” 

“I want to know everything about you, but that’s not the point. Use your words, H. I don’t want to do anything you’re not comfortable with.” 

“Alright.” Helena covered Dinah’s hand with her own, skin against skin, and offered Dinah the largest smile she could muster. It was not very large, but it was the thought that counted, and from the grin Dinah gave in return Helena knew she’d done something right. “I can try.” 

“That’s all I ask, beautiful. Now do you wanna go eat, or do you wanna sit here and make eyes at each other all night?” 

Helena wanted to do both, if she was being totally honest, especially since Dinah had just called her beautiful. The last person to call her beautiful had been her father, which wasn’t the same, and Helena had always thought of herself as a fairly normal-looking person. She had a very sharp face, pointed nose and pointed chin, mouth small and angry, there was so much tension in her eyes and her brows and her cheeks and her jaw that it was hard to see past the mask of silent anger she wore all the time. Did Dinah see beyond that facade of pure rage, use her dark eyes to peel Helena’s mask away and find the woman underneath? She could have sat there for the rest of her life, honestly. But she was also starving, so she squeezed Dinah’s hand once and undid her seatbelt. 

Dinah apparently knew the owners of this restaurant, because they were seated in a small corner booth within a minute of walking in, tucked mostly away from the rest of the half-empty dining room with a paper lantern dangling above their heads. It was a nice place, soft music trickling in from somewhere and the walls were painted dark red, red like Dinah’s mouth as it curved into a smile, red like the rose Harley had probably eaten by now (she was always pulling weird shit like that). Dinah settled across from Helena and tucked some hair behind her ear, exposing gold earrings and the length of her smooth neck, like she was trying to straight-up kill Helena. It was working. 

“Oh, you did it.” Dinah said as Helena took her jacket off, propping her chin in her hand and smiling wide. God, her smile made Helena feel like her heart had been set on fire or something, Dinah had the most perfect smile in the entire world, big and bright and lovely, and Helena could look at her smile forever. “Flex?” 

Helena flexed, the muscles in her bicep tightening, and Dinah bit her lip, somehow managing to not leave a mark in her lipstick as she watched Helena’s arms. That warm, hungry feeling curled around her stomach, something hot and desperate and angry. Did she have a stomach bug? There had to be something wrong there. Something was the matter with her. Was she sick? Helena had never gotten sick often, not even as a child, and when she did get sick she muscled through it. Dinah returned her gaze to Helena’s face, which was maybe even more stressful than getting her biceps stared at. “You know, I don’t know anything about you.” 

“You know lots of things about me.” Helena said. Dinah knew a few things, bits and pieces divulged drunk or in the middle of the night, but no more than was really necessary. She didn’t like to think she was a particularly interesting person beyond the massacre of her entire family and the ensuing fifteen years of devoting her life to vengeance, really she wasn’t a person at all beyond that. Dinah rolled her eyes, twisting a ring in a full circle around her finger. 

“I didn’t know how old you were until, like, two weeks ago. I don’t know what your favourite colour is or what your favourite book is or what music you listen to while you work out.” Dinah tilted her head, hair shifting over her shoulders, and raised an eyebrow expectantly. God. Helena inhaled, exhaled, and used her words. 

“My favourite colour is purple, I don’t have a favourite book, and I like Salmo.”

“You don’t have a favourite book?” 

“Not really. I wasn’t allowed to touch Luca’s books, they were all really old, and I can’t read in English well-”

“Ready to order?” A man materialized beside their table, setting down a steaming teapot and two small mugs. Helena didn’t go to restaurants particularly often, normally only with Harley or Cass or Renee or Dinah, but she was fairly certain you had to read the menu before you ordered food. “Should I come back?” 

“Helena, you trust me, right?” Dinah asked, she hadn’t even opened her menu yet, and Helena figured that with my life was not an acceptable answer, so she nodded. “Cool. Fifteen mild, eleven medium, twenty-three with extra rice, please.”

Huh. The man nodded and left, leaving them with the teapot between them, and Helena didn’t know what to do. Did she pour it? Leave it? Finish what she was saying? Stop what she was saying? She should have looked it up or let Harley give her a little bit of coaching or something, anything to keep her from looking stupid in front of Dinah. 

“Who’s Luca?” Dinah picked up the teapot and poured Helena a cup first, fragrant steam wafting over the table as she poured some for herself. Helena wrapped her fingers around the mug, she didn’t drink tea but it smelled really good, and tried to think of a way to describe her relationship to Luca. 

“One of the men who raised me in Sicily.” Helena took a sip of the tea. Herbal tea, maybe jasmine or something, and it warmed the back of her throat. She’d never had anything like this, hot and bittersweet and lovely, and Dinah must have seen the look on her face because she laughed, a sound that warmed Helena more than the tea ever could. 

“You never talk about your life before.” Dinah drank some of her tea, careful not to get lipstick on the rim of the cup, and rested her chin in her hand. She looked genuinely interested, like she cared about Helena’s answer, and it was a very weird feeling to know that she was being asked a question with no motive beyond actual care, concern, Dinah actually wanted to know things about her. 

“You never ask” 

“I figured it was a bit of a touchy subject. Plus, Renee asked you about it one time and you nearly chewed her head off.” 

“I don’t mind so much, if it’s you.” 

Dinah laughed again, flashing those two perfect dimples in her cheeks, and her warm eyes could have stopped Helena’s heart. What? Had she said something wrong? She genuinely didn’t mind Dinah asking questions about her life, but when Renee had turned to her one day and asked point-blank why Sal hadn’t just left her to die, Helena had nearly broken her nose. (Renee had been so drunk she was incoherent and she had apologized a hundred times when she had sobered up, but still). 

“You’re smooth as hell, Helena Rosa.” Dinah refilled both their cups without asking, her eyes never leaving Helena’s face, and Helena felt like she was about to fall into a million pieces. She didn’t like her middle name, it had been her father’s mother’s name and her grandmother had been a witch, but it had never sounded sweeter than when it fell from Dinah’s lips. “Will you tell me about it?” 

“Depends.” Helena shrugged, swirling the tea around in the mug. Loose leaves floated in the bottom, like bits of basil or oregano, bleeding ribbons of dark green into her tea, and when she drank another sip the flavour was stronger. Hmm. Tea was good after all. Who knew. “What do you want to know about it?” 

Dinah’s eyebrows pulled together in that way they did when she was thinking. Helena loved that expression, she would tattoo it on her forehead if she could. Well, that seemed like a little much, but her point stood. She ran her tongue over her teeth, pink against white against red, and tapped the fingers of the hand not propping her chin up against the tablecloth. “How’d you get out?” 

“Sal.” Helena didn’t cry. She didn’t get choked up, she didn’t get sad, she refused to get emotional, feelings were a weakness she could not afford to have. When she had been twelve, Luca had forced her to tell him her story, if she cried or faltered or stuttered she had to start over, and she could speak of it now with expert detachment. “When they stopped shooting, I was still alive. I thought maybe, if I didn’t move, they’d think I was dead and if they thought I was dead, I could run like hell and not look back. It was Sal’s job to check the bodies for a pulse, and when he looked at me and saw me alive, I knew that I was dead. I thought he would tell Galante he had missed one and then I’d be pumped full of bullets or tortured for any information I had about the diamond. Instead he left me there and promised he’d come back. I stayed there for what felt like days, but Sal came back for me. He took me back to his house, got us a pair of passports that said he was my dad, and the next day we were on a flight to Sicily.” 

Dinah watched Helena carefully as she spoke, dark eyes studying Helena’s face without flickering away once. Dinah had this way of looking at Helena that made her feel vulnerable, like Dinah’s gaze could strip away every bit of anger and hate and misery, leaving her raw and bare and naked as a newborn. The gold in her ears and her nose and the corners of her eyes glittered and Helena swore she’d never seen anything more beautiful. 

“Sal sounds like a good man.” Dinah said finally, resting her hand halfway across the table. A silent offer, letting Helena know she could take it if she wanted but she didn’t have to. God, Dinah was so kind. The kindest person Helena had ever known. She hadn’t known very many people, really, so Dinah didn’t have a high bar to clear, but she was clearing it. 

“Yeah, he is.” He was. Sal was not a nice person, he was quick to anger and he had killed a lot of people and he could be very grumpy, but Sal was also the person who had saved her life and taken her in and helped her get revenge. He had given her a purpose and a home and for that, she would be forever grateful. Helena took Dinah’s hand, forcing herself to breathe, and rubbed her thumb along Dinah’s scraped-up knuckles. All of them seemed to have perpetually busted knuckles, there was a scrape on Dinah’s right hand and bruises patterning her left, green and yellow against brown skin. Dinah smiled softly, squeezing Helena’s hand, and Helena inhaled hard. 

“I heard about you when it happened.” Dinah said, her fingers warm and strong against Helena’s. “In the Gazette. My mom didn’t want me to read about it, so I only saw the picture, and it was of this girl and her mom. I remember looking at that picture for a long time, partly because this girl was younger than me, and partly, I think, because this girl looked so happy. She was smiling and her mom was looking at her like she was her pride and joy. Reminded me of me and my mom, ‘cept not rich and fancy and white.” 

Helena hadn’t known they had put her family in the newspaper. To be fair, at the time she had been a little bit busy with the whole moving to Sicily to become a ruthless killer thing, but still. It made sense, though, a prominent mafia family gunned down in their own home was the type of thing to make headlines. Dinah was still looking at her, still holding Helena’s hand, and did she want an answer? What was Helena supposed to say to that? God, she was bad at this. 

“You don’t talk about your mom.” Helena echoed what Dinah had said to her less than five minutes ago, which was true. Helena knew that Dinah’s mom was dead and that Renee had known her, but that was about it. Wait, not true. Dinah’s mom’s name was Laurel, and that she knew because it was Dinah’s middle name. 

“You don’t ask.” Dinah’s lips curled into a half-smile and she laughed, taking a sip of her tea. “Tell you what. Question for a question. I asked you one, you can ask me one. Deal?” 

“You asked me,” Helena counted on her fingers. “Five questions.” 

“Touche, beautiful. My favourite colour is yellow, my favourite book is Gone Girl, and I listen to Rihanna when I work out. There. You have two now. Use them wisely.” 

Helena didn’t know what Rihanna was, and she vaguely remembered seeing a book with that title on Dinah’s desk, but she really hated asking Dinah to explain pop culture (Cass was the best at it) so she smiled back, trying to think of something else to ask. Wow, dates were hard. Why did people go on these? You could have dinner by yourself. Nobody had to be there with you, you could just go out and have a meal alone. And then Dinah grinned, raising a teasing eyebrow, and Helena knew why people went on dates and she hoped they would go on many, many more. 

“What did you want to be when you were young?” 

“That’s not a question about my mom.”

“I know. What did you want to do?” 

Dinah sighed, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. She had lovely hair, blonde and long and full of gold jewellery, it always smelled of lavender and Helena spent what was quite frankly an embarrassing amount of time thinking about how soft Dinah’s hair would feel against her skin. “I wanted to be a princess for a few years. I had a crown and a pink dress and a scepter, and I’d pretend my mom was a secret queen of some far-away country and any day I’d be whisked away to live in a palace and drink tea and dance with princes for the rest of my life.” 

A laugh escaped Helena’s mouth before she could stuff it back down, the idea of a tiny Dinah in a tiara and a poofy pink dress was fucking ridiculous, and Dinah was staring at her, an unreadable expression on her face. And now she’d laughed at Dinah and now Dinah was never going to speak to her again. Fuck. Helena stopped laughing as quickly as she’d started, drinking some tea to wash the shame out of her mouth. Fuck fuck fuck. 

“You look like her when you laugh.” Dinah tapped a finger on the back of Helena’s hand, her eyes not leaving Helena’s face. She was still just looking, as if she was trying to commit Helena to memory, half a smile playing on her lips. “That girl in the newspaper. You look happy.” 

“I am that girl in the newspaper.” Did Helena not normally look like herself? She had no photos of herself from ages ten to twenty-three, but she hadn’t changed that much. Had she? It was hard to say. 

“I know.” Dinah seemed like she wanted to say more, that crinkle had returned to her eyebrows, but they were interrupted by several plates of food. Bright vegetables, meat covered in sauce, a few things Helena had never seen in her life. The man set the food down, along with four slim pieces of wood, and left them to their meal. He hadn’t left forks. Was she supposed to eat with her hands? God, that would be embarrassing. She’d probably spill on herself. 

Dinah, clearly grateful for the distraction, began to use two of the sticks to serve a plate, putting a bit of everything on it before sliding it over to Helena. Huh. Some meat, some vegetables, a scoop of tiny white pieces Helena had no name for. Okay, so you ate with the sticks. Good to know. Dinah got herself a plate, the same as Helena’s, and Helena watched her hands. She was holding the sticks in one hand, between her thumb and first finger, using them with the same easy grace that she did everything, as if they were a natural extension of her hands. 

“Never used chopsticks?” Dinah asked, which seemed like a rhetorical question because of course Helena had never used chopsticks. She hadn’t even know what they were called. “Here. Relax your fingers.” 

Dinah positioned Helena’s fingers with her own, her hands were warm and soft and she adjusted Helena’s grip on the chopsticks carefully. How would those fingers feel on her torso, on her neck, on her thighs or her hips or her waist? Another strange feeling twisted against her stomach, behind her navel, hot and vicious, and Helena shook her head hard. She had zero time for this, this, whatever this was. She couldn’t have a fucking stomach bug right now. “There you go. Pinch the tips together and you can pick up your food properly.” 

Helena gave the chopsticks a few experimental taps before frowning at the food in front of her. What did she eat first? The vegetables? The meat? The little white grains? Did she eat them together or separately? Fuck, she should have suggested Italian. It would have been shitty American Italian food, but Helena at least knew how to eat it. 

“Dinah?” She said, looking up at the beautiful woman across from her. Dinah was mixing her meat with the white bits, staining the grains with sauce, and she was overwhelmingly pretty, the kind of pretty that made Helena sweaty, but now was not the moment to remark on Dinah’s dimples or the length of her eyelashes. “I don’t know what this is.” 

“You don’t know what rice is?” Both of Dinah’s eyebrows went up, for a moment she looked horrified and then she laughed, her brows returning to their usual vaguely skeptical state. “Sorry. Don’t tell Renee you don’t know what rice is, alright? She’d deck you and I have big plans for that gorgeous face. Mix everything together and then eat it. Best that way.” 

Helena did as she was told, her brain had stopped responding the second Dinah called her gorgeous, and carefully lifted a bite to her mouth. Jesus. She’d never tasted anything like this in her life, it was sweet and salty and sour and spicy and fucking delicious. Dinah grinned, watching Helena chew, and stirred her food. “It’s good, right?” 

“It’s fucking amazing.” Helena covered her mouth with a hand as she swallowed, her mother had always gotten mad when she had bad table manners. She and Pino had always had excellent manners, it had been very important to their parents that they could conduct themselves properly. What they hadn’t taught Helena was how to use chopsticks, because no Italian food required them. 

“I know. This is one of my favourite places to eat in the city.” Dinah took a bite of chicken and for a few minutes, they ate in silence, Helena had never tasted anything so delicious in her life (it might have had something to do with the fact that Dinah was looking at her after every bite to see if she liked it, all warm eyes and pretty mouth). “Okay, if me wanting to be a princess is so funny, what did you want to be when you were little?”

“Close to yours. Mafia princess.” Dinah laughed, expertly picking up a piece of broccoli and motioning for Helena to continue. “I didn’t have a choice. I was the oldest of the third generation of Bertinellis. Normally, the oldest son took over, but my dad thought I could run the family just as well as any man. So that was what I was going to be, didn’t matter what I wanted to do.”

“What did you want to do? If you got to pick?” 

“Honestly?” 

“Nah, I want you to lie.” Dinah deadpanned and Helena blinked. She could lie if Dinah wanted her to, if it was easier. Was it a joke? Helena was bad at understanding jokes, especially when Dinah’s normal voice always sounded a bit like she was being sarcastic. “Yes, the truth, beautiful. Always the truth.” 

“I wanted to be a teacher.” Helena had always liked the idea of teaching. She liked the idea of being able to work with kids, show them things, help them with learning. When she had been younger, kinder, less angry and less bitter, she had been good with kids, mostly her brother and her parent’s friends’ children, but she had always wanted to help. “For younger kids. Like elementary school or something.”

“Huh.” Dinah scooped up some rice, a few grains falling from her chopsticks onto the tablecloth. She either didn’t notice or didn’t care, she hadn’t looked away from Helena once. “You’d be a good teacher.” 

“I’m too mean.” 

“You aren’t mean. You’re a little prickly, sure, and sometimes you’re kinda grouchy, but you aren’t mean. You’ve got a big heart under all that leather and biceps and scowling.” 

“I’m not just leather and biceps and scowling.” 

“Right, my bad. You’ve also got a couple hundred mil in the bank and a great ass.” 

Helena choked on her rice. Oh, Jesus. Dinah winked and did that thing where she took her bottom lip between her teeth and the stomach bug Helena was now convinced she was suffering from punched her in the navel again. Fuck. What the hell was she supposed to say to that? Did she compliment Dinah’s ass in return? Was that how you flirted with someone? No, that was dumb. The warmth in her stomach was slowly becoming a fucking inferno and god, she was going to die. 

“You forgot my motorcycle.” She managed, trying to wash down the rice with her tea. Did Helena have a great ass? She didn’t spend a lot of (read: any) time looking at her own ass, but she spent way too much time looking at Dinah’s and she was fairly certain hers did not look like that. 

“I’ve chosen to ignore your motorcycle since you still haven’t taken me on it.” Dinah lifted a brow. It was true, but that was only because Helena genuinely didn’t trust herself with an adult-sized passenger. Cass was fine, it wasn’t that much different from riding with her gear tossed on the back, but she never took Renee or Harley or Dinah on her bike. Did she need to start? The idea of Dinah straddling a motorcycle was a very nice one, especially if it was with her arms wrapped around Helena’s waist and her chin on Helena’s shoulder, her chest pressed to Helena’s back, fingers playing across Helena’s stomach. 

“I can take you on a ride if you want.” 

“Oh, I fully expect to be taken on a ride.” 

“Am I good at this?” Helena blurted before she could stop herself, biting down hard on the inside of her cheek. Fuck. She had never been good at social interactions and she was fairly certain that asking about your dating skills while you were on a fucking date was a bit of a faux pas. Fuck fuck fuck. “Dating, I mean. Or, like, going on a date, I guess.”

Dinah scraped some more rice onto Helena’s plate and then her own, like she knew Helena had been about to get herself some more rice, and added more meat and sauce and vegetables to both of their plates. “Well, considering the food and the company, I’d say this is the best date I’ve ever been on.” 

“Me too.” 

“I should hope so, considering it’s the only date you’ve ever been on. Unless you’ve been lying to me.” 

“Never.” Helena said quickly, chopsticks poised over her food. “Not to you.” 

“Yeah, you’re pretty bad at it. You get this cute little crinkle between your eyebrows.” Dinah smiled, gesturing with her chopsticks at Helena’s forehead. She did? Helena didn’t know that. Her mother would be pissed if she knew, lying was a skill Helena had needed and one she’d never been able to master. She ate another bite of rice (Wow, rice was so good. How had she never eaten rice before?) and smiled back, watching Dinah’s jaw move as she chewed. Even fucking chewing looked good when Dinah did it. No fair. 

“So you don’t read books. What about movies? Please tell me you’ve seen a movie before.” 

“I’ve seen movies. I liked that one Renee showed me with those people like my family.” 

“Renee showed you The Godfather?” Dinah rolled her eyes, flicking hair off her neck. “Of course she did. She probably thought you’d think it was a documentary or something.” 

“It was pretty accurate. I don’t think my dad left horse heads in people’s beds, though.” Helena didn’t think he did. He might have and chosen not to tell his children, but she’d never know now. “And Cass got me to watch that movie with the basketball and the cartoons. That was kinda funny.” 

“Space Jam is a classic.” Dinah conceded. God, she had pretty eyes. Dark and warm and lovely, her gaze could make Helena’s heart stutter in her chest and every time Dinah looked at her, half a smile on her lips and her eyes crinkled at the corners, Helena felt like she was about to drop dead. 

She liked talking to Dinah. There was a familiarity to their conversation, the kind that came from a year of fighting and teasing and stab wounds and late nights and too much vodka, Helena had never really enjoyed talking but she could have spent days chatting with Dinah like this, trading jokes in between bites of food. She’d never felt this kind of warmth towards another person before, this feeling in her stomach, this light. Dinah was a shining light and Helena was just grateful to be able to bask in her glow. 

What if she ruined it? What if kissing or whatever people who liked each other did ruined this easy friendship? What if everything was good and then she fucked it up with clumsy hands and awkward lips? Helena didn’t know how to do this, and what if Dinah wanted her to know how to do this? She didn’t even really know what kissing was beyond the fact that it involved putting mouths together and that she wanted to do it with Dinah (To Dinah? With Dinah? Against Dinah?). Oh, God. 

“Fuck.” Dinah laughed, setting her chopsticks down on the side of her empty plate. They had cleared the plates entirely, a few grains of rice and several pools of sauce were all that remained of the delicious food, and Helena hadn’t spilled on herself. She gave herself a mental fist-bump for that one. “That was so good. You liked it, right?” 

“No, I hated it.” Helena tried to match Dinah’s deadpan, she was not good at making jokes, and Dinah’s mouth dropped open. Shit. Had she messed it up? Her tone probably wasn’t joking enough and oh fuck-

“Helena Bertinelli, was that a joke? Did you just make a joke?” Dinah’s grin was wide enough to make Helena’s breath catch in her throat, all deep dimples and red lips, she had the prettiest smile in the entire universe and it was directed at Helena. Wow. “Did you get body-snatched or something?”

“I don’t know what that means.” 

“We’ll watch it sometime.” The man came by, cleared the plates, and left a receipt face-down in the middle of the table. Helena reached for it, but Dinah was quicker, folding her fingers around the thin white paper. “Nope. I asked you out, I pay. Them’s the rules.” 

“I’m paying next time.” Helena grumbled, but rules were rules. She didn’t realize the implication of her words until they were out of her mouth and was she being presumptuous? Oh, god, she was being presumptuous. Dinah raised an eyebrow and smiled, smoothing out a fifty-dollar bill. “I mean, if you want, y’know, for, uh, there to be a next time.”

“Oh, there’s gonna be a next time.” Dinah’s grin was nothing short of devilish and Helena could have drowned in that smile, in the curve of those perfect lips, and she set the fifty down on the table in a single motion that had Helena following the length of her long, toned arm. “I’m not letting Harley snatch you up.” 

“I don’t like Harley.” Helena followed Dinah’s lead and put her jacket back on, trying to be subtle while she slipped a mint into her mouth. Between her teeth and her lip until it melted and then a thin layer of her tongue. Would her mouth taste of mint if Dinah kissed her? Was that the point of mints? 

“Nobody likes Harley.” Dinah took Helena’s arm, fingers wrapping around Helena’s bicep, and Helena flexed very slightly, just enough to make Dinah squeeze her arm. Dinah seemed to like Helena’s muscles, which was pretty cool considering Helena was nothing but muscle, and she led Helena back outside. “She’s the fucking worst.” 

That wasn’t strictly true. Harley did suck, a lot, but she wasn’t the **worst**. She was like, the medium worst. Was that a thing? Probably not. It was dark outside, colder than it had been, and Jesus, Dinah wasn’t even wearing a jacket. She was wearing a tight gold shirt and it was definitely not warm enough for her to not have a jacket on. Helena took hers off and wrapped it around Dinah’s shoulders, and while she was fairly certain that a leather jacket wouldn’t be much help Dinah grinned at her. “Thanks, Robin Hood.” 

What now? Did they go home? Go somewhere else? Did they go back to Dinah’s or Helena’s? Did they go for dessert? Oh, god. She should have asked Renee or Harley what to do after the dinner portion of a date was over. They sat in Dinah’s car, fingers twined over the center console, and then Dinah turned to Helena and squeezed her hand. 

“Can I ask you a really weird favour?” Dinah did that thing she did with her voice that made Helena’s stomach turn inside-out, her lips parting to show off clean white teeth. Helena spent way too long thinking about Dinah’s mouth, looking at it, wondering how it would feel against her own, daydreaming about the feeling of it on her neck . “And you can say no and I won’t blame you at all. I won’t hold it against you even a little.” 

“Go for it.” What kind of favour did Dinah need? Was this a normal thing? Her stupid overthinking brain. 

“I slept really badly last night. I think it might have been because I wasn’t with you.” Helena’s heart leapt up her throat, lodging itself firmly in her windpipe and holding firm. “Do you mind if I sleep at yours tonight? No expectations. Just sleeping. Nothing but sleeping.” 

“Of course.” Helena, though she’d rather die than admit it, had slept pretty badly last night too. She’d woken up freezing and oddly lonely and Dinah exhaled, her shoulders relaxing. Helena took a very deep breath, willing herself not to pussy out of finishing her sentence. “But, uh, what if I, I mean, if I don’t want to just sleep?”

Dinah’s lazy grin made that thing in Helena’s stomach twist again. Jesus, was she fucking dying? Had she contracted a parasite or some shit like that? God, that would suck. Dinah tilted her head just slightly, her eyes travelling up and down and back up again, and then she bit down on her bottom lip and moved some of Helena’s hair behind her ear, fingers grazing her skin. “Then you better pray that Harley’s cleared out of your place, beautiful, because she is definitely not invited."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> helena: is horny  
> helena: hmm weird. must be a tapeworm. 
> 
> also i read all your comments and they make me so happy.


	10. x: birds of prey (and the sexual awakening of one helena bertinelli)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> helena kisses a girl and then kisses her some more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alright i refused to proofread this because i'd end up deleting half of it. this is just 8k of porn but it's porn with like feelings.

By some miracle, Harley had left. She had taken Cass, a single couch cushion, and Helena’s peanut butter, but she had left. Thank fucking god. 

Helena locked the door behind them, more out of habit than anything else, sliding the chain across the door as Dinah took her shoes off and hung Helena’s jacket on the hook. It occured to Helena that Dinah had never actually been in her apartment for any length of time, just that morning before they had gone shopping, and that didn’t really count. 

She didn’t own a lot of furniture. Helena had a double bed, a gross couch now missing a cushion, a small side table, a dresser missing a leg, and that was it. Her kitchen was small and contained a single plate, a single bowl, a single fork and knife and spoon, and a single glass (she didn’t cook often), and there were no decorations at all beyond a bunch of arrows dangling out of one wall. It had never occurred to her to make this apartment a home, it was just a place where she slept and showered and kept her stuff, but as Dinah looked around, hands tucked into her pockets, Helena wished she had a painting or, like, a plant. Something. 

“Typically, when you invite someone up after a date, you offer them a drink.” Dinah said, peering into Helena’s messy bathroom. “Where’s your bathroom door?” 

Oh. Fuck. She had something to drink, right? Helena kept very little food or beverages at her place, mostly to discourage people from coming over, but she was fairly certain there were a couple bottles of Italian liquor on top of her fridge. “Uh, a couple dudes broke in to try and beat me up or whatever, and the door broke. I didn’t really feel like replacing it.” 

“Ah.” Dinah nodded as if that made perfect sense, following Helena into the kitchen and leaning against the counter. She looked so comfortable in Helena’s space, like she belonged here, in the shabby kitchen with no pots or pans and knives and arrows lined up to dry in the dishrack. Maybe she did belong here. Maybe they belonged together, in this apartment, making heated eye contact and slow dancing in the living room and making out sometimes. 

“Okay, I have limoncello and some authentic Sicilian wine that is very old.” Helena took both bottles down. The wine had been gifted by Massimo and Sal and Luca before she had left Sicily, only to be drunk after she had killed the men who had killed her family. The day after Sionis’ death, alone in her apartment with nothing left to live for, she had downed half the bottle, thrown up on herself, and cried in the bathtub for three hours. It had not been her finest moment. Helena hadn’t touched it since, she didn’t like drinking alone and she especially didn’t like drinking fancy wine alone. “Pick your poison.” 

“How strong is limoncello?” Dinah asked, tucking one ankle behind the other and crossing her arms over her chest. Helena, who didn’t actually know how strong it was, turned the bottle over and read the label. She had started drinking limoncello when she was thirteen, drinking culture in Italy was way more lax than in the states, Luca had let her have a small glass with dinner twice a week and by the time she was eighteen she was drinking wine with every lunch. Her drinking had come to a very abrupt halt once she had moved back to Gotham, mostly because it was generally frowned upon to drink three glasses of red at lunch (unless you were Renee) and she had stopped drinking by herself after the Birds of Prey had been formed. 

“24 percent.” Helena shrugged, retrieving the only glass she owned from her cabinet. It was clean, thank god, and she could just drink out of the bowl or something. Dinah laughed, her eyes tracking Helena as she took the ice cube tray out of the freezer. Limoncello was supposed to be chilled, but Helena didn’t drink it often enough to justify keeping it in the fridge. 

“Maybe we just have a little bit, then.” Dinah watched Helena pour two fingers of the pale yellow liquor over ice, that half-smile on her perfect lips. Helena poured a little bit less into her cereal bowl, she didn’t bother with ice, and handed Dinah her glass. Their fingers touched and Helena inhaled sharply. God, how was she going to manage to kiss Dinah if a brush of fingertips against her own had her short of breath? 

“Cheers, beautiful.” Dinah clinked her glass against Helena’s bowl and brought it to her lips, eyes lingering on Helena’s mouth as she drank. Alright. Confidence, Helena. Be confident, be strong, Dinah was clearly interested and there was no time like the fucking present.

Helena finished her bowl in two massive swallows and set it down, trying to ignore the burn at the back of her throat as lemon and sugar and liquor coated her tongue. Dinah smiled again, sipping her own drink, and her eyes were teasing, like she knew something Helena didn’t. She did. She knew so many things that Helena didn’t, how to kiss, how to tangle hands in hair, how to trail fingers up spines and lips along skin. 

“Easy.” Dinah grinned, putting her glass down on the counter beside her. She boosted herself onto that counter, that warm, hungry look in her eyes, and moved her hair off her neck. She had a perfect neck, long and smooth and pretty, and Helena wondered how it would feel to kiss the space just beneath her ear, over the pulse in her throat, past the low neck of her shirt. “Don’t make yourself sick.”

“You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen” Helena said suddenly, apparently the limoncello had loosened her tongue, and if Dinah was startled she didn’t show it, just sat on the counter and watched Helena as she continued. “Sometimes I look at you and I feel like I’m about to pass out. I had a dream about you and I think about you all the time and I can’t breathe when you smile at me because you see me in a way that no one else ever has. I’ve never done this before, any of this, and you are so beautiful and so kind and I don’t want to disappoint you and-” 

“Hey.” Dinah hooked her foot around Helena’s calf and tugged her closer, the kitchen was so small that they were face to face, her smile wide and lovely and enough to stop Helena’s heart. They were so close, Dinah’s knees on either side of Helena’s hips and their chests not quite touching, Dinah’s face tilted up to Helena’s. “You could never, ever disappoint me. Ever. You’re strong and you’re brave and you’re gentle in your own weird way. I like you, so so much, and I don’t care what you have or haven’t done before. I care about you.” 

Helena took a deep breath, the smell of lavender and salt washing over her, and Dinah looked at her, her eyes crinkling at the corners like they did when she smiled. God, Helena’s hands were shaking at her sides and her heart was pounding and Dinah was just looking at her, all perfect brown eyes and long lashes and soft smooth skin. “You had a dream about me?” 

“Yeah.” Helena nodded, her skin felt hot, feverish, like she’d been lit on fire, and Dinah pulled her a bit closer, her heels pressed into the back of Helena’s knees. Dinah’s body was warm where it brushed hers, Helena could feel the heat through both of their clothes. How warm would Dinah be if they were skin-to-skin, if she peeled Dinah’s shirt and pants off, if Dinah peeled her shirt and pants off, if they were naked and pressed together? Oh fuck oh god oh fuck.

“What were we doing in this dream?” Dinah asked, her breath smelled of lemons and her teasing grin could have knocked Helena flat. God, they were so close together, closer than Helena had been to another person in her entire life, Dinah was radiating warmth and light and sunshine and it was overwhelming, overloading her mind, making her fucking crazy. 

“Kissing.” Helena muttered, even standing between Dinah’s thighs with their mouths inches apart and the semi-romantic speeches they’d just delivered Helena felt ashamed to say it, like Dinah might laugh in her face for even suggesting the idea. No. Fuck. No second-guessing. Confidence was attractive, right? Right? 

“Where was I kissing you?” Dinah traced Helena’s ear with a single finger, over the closed-up hole in her earlobe where her mother had pierced it as a baby. She had stopped wearing earrings in Sicily, Luca thought they’d be ripped out in a fight, and had never bothered to get them repierced. Where had they been kissing? On a couch, Helena was fairly sure. She hadn’t been paying that much attention to the location. 

“On a couch.” Helena’s breath hitched when Dinah slid her finger down the side of her neck, stopping at the collar of her shirt. Dinah’s answering laugh sent a jolt down Helena’s spine, like she had just been electrocuted, and she ran her finger back up to Helena’s ear to move a bit of hair away from her neck. 

“Wrong where, beautiful.” Dinah said, every one of her movements slow and deliberate. Where else were you supposed to—oh. Her surprise must have shown on her face, because Dinah laughed again and shifted forwards just enough that they were sharing breath. Oh, Jesus. Helena’s cheeks burned, but she refused to take her eyes off Dinah’s. Confidence, Bertinelli. Confidence. “Did I kiss you here?” 

Dinah pressed those full red lips to Helena’s jaw and every single nerve in Helena’s body caught on fire. Her mouth was so soft and so warm and so achingly gentle and Helena sagged into the touch, bracing her hands on either side of Dinah’s hips so she didn’t collapse in Dinah’s arms. That would have been embarrassing. 

“Here?” Dinah murmured against the hard line of Helena’s cheek, right beneath her cheekbone, her nose grazing Helena’s skin. Helena shut her eyes, breathing in lavender and salt and lemon and a scent that was wholly Dinah, a scent she’d bathe in if she could, the hairs on the back of her neck prickling. God, she was going to die. She was going to die right here and Dinah hadn't even kissed her on the lips yet. 

“Or here?” Dinah kissed the corner of Helena’s mouth and her lips were so fucking soft, like silk or velvet or...something else that was soft, Helena didn’t really know what else was soft but she knew that Dinah’s lips were the softest thing she’d ever felt in her whole existence. She kissed the other side of Helena’s mouth, probably printing her skin with red lipstick, but Helena didn’t care. Let Dinah cover her in the stuff. Let the world know that she had been kissed, that she had been marked up, that Dinah cared for her and wanted to kiss her and wanted her. 

And then Dinah pulled away, smiled at Helena, and kissed her. Helena fucking broke. She knew that kissing would be nice, why else did people do it, but she hadn’t expected this. She hadn’t expected to melt into Dinah’s lips, to feel that twisting heat in the pit of her stomach, to crumble entirely and rely solely on Dinah’s mouth to keep her whole. Dinah tasted of limoncello, which shouldn’t have surprised Helena but did, and she was so, so fucking soft. 

This was it. This was a year of tension and flirting and teasing and denial, a world-shattering, explosive, burning kiss, hot and desperate and wanting and Dinah took Helena’s bottom lip between her teeth and pulled and Helena burst into flames. Fuck. She couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, all she could do was open her mouth and let Dinah fit their lips together, tongue against tongue, noses bumping together, Helena could feel Dinah’s lashes brushing her cheeks and it was fucking heaven. 

Helena had forgotten she didn’t know how to do this. She had forgotten everything, really, everything beyond Dinah’s lips had faded to black, and she groaned into Dinah’s mouth, a very embarrassing noise that made Dinah kiss her harder. Dinah slid one hand into Helena’s hair and dug her fingers into Helena’s scalp, which hurt, but not enough to keep Helena from groaning again and leaning into Dinah’s touch. 

“Wow.” Dinah said when they finally came up for air, lipstick smeared and pupils blown, and Helena’s breathing was so shallow she felt light-headed. Their mouths were still connected by a thin trail of spit, which was way hotter than it had any right to be, and Dinah took Helena’s face in her hands and ran her thumb over her bottom lip. 

“Wow.” Helena echoed, her heart felt like it was about to beat right out of her chest and her cheeks hurt from smiling and Dinah was just looking at her, dark eyes and soft lashes and deep dimples and perfect red lips. Liquid heat pooled in the pit of her stomach, like molten fire, and Helena didn’t know what to do. She didn’t know what to do with her hands or her lips or her legs or her arms or her eyes, but she knew that this want, this hunger, this desperation, was all for Dinah. It was a strange feeling, an unfamiliar one, and Helena placed a tentative hand on Dinah’s hip, marvelling at the way it fit perfectly in her palm, like Helena’s fingers had been made to wrap around the curve and stay there. She wanted to leave her hand there, to feel the heat of Dinah’s body underneath her hand, to hold her and never let her go.

“What do you want, Helena?” Dinah asked, still tracing the seam of Helena’s lip with her thumb in slow, even strokes. What did she want? She wanted Dinah. She wanted whatever Dinah was willing to give, to kiss her and touch her and savour the feeling of skin on skin, to hopefully not have a complete meltdown when Dinah touched her. Hopefully. It was still possible, but Dinah had this strange sort of calming energy, she kept Helena sane and drove her crazy at the same time. 

“I don’t know.” Helena said against Dinah’s thumb, wondering if it would be too weird to take the tip of Dinah’s finger into her mouth. It would be weird, she decided, and a little too much for the moment, but Dinah’s thumb was warm and callused and she could have died right then. “Everything. Anything. I just want you.” 

“That would be way smoother if you weren’t shaking.” Dinah dragged her thumb down to Helena’s chin, half a smile on her lips, and kissed Helena again. God, her lips were so soft and so sweet, Dinah’s kiss was the best thing Helena had ever felt, better than that moment she had put an arrow in Victor Zsasz’s neck, better than the first time she had laughed with Harley and Renee and Cass and Dinah, better than anything and everything and why didn’t people just kiss all the time? Helena never wanted to do anything besides kiss Dinah ever again and this was only their second kiss. 

Helena had very few regrets in her life, but wearing a fucking turtleneck on a first date was definitely one of them. Dinah kissed her face, her cheeks and chin and jaw and the thin stripe of skin above the collar of her shirt, both of her hands buried in Helena’s hair and her knees pressing into Helena’s hips. Helena kissed Dinah hard, as hard as she could, Dinah was the air she needed to breathe and the only thing keeping her tied to this world, fisting the back of Dinah’s shirt in one hand and digging her fingers into Dinah’s hip with the other. 

She had no idea where this confidence was coming from, but she knew that she wanted Dinah more than she’d ever wanted anything in her entire life, she wanted Dinah so bad it fucking hurt, and Dinah made a noise that made Helena’s breath catch in her chest, warm ringed hands on either side of her head. Dinah broke the kiss first, pulling her hands out of Helena’s hair and leaning back against the cupboards. She was the most beautiful thing Helena had ever seen, her lips wet with spit and lipstick, that lazy smile making her dimples stand out, her gaze bright and teasing.

“We are not doing this on a kitchen counter.” Dinah looked Helena up and down, bottom lip between her teeth, and every single nerve in Helena’s body burst into flame. God, even Dinah’s eyes were making Helena’s stomach clench, those flecks of gold by her lashes sparkled in the light from Helena’s lamp, and Helena took a very sharp breath. “I’d say couch, but you’re missing a cushion.” 

“Fucking Harley.” Helena swore and Dinah slid off the countertop, stepping forward to wrap her arms around Helena’s neck. She tugged at a strand of Helena’s hair gently, still smiling, and nudged Helena backwards. Fuck, she was so lucky she lived in such a small apartment. Her bed was eight steps away from the kitchen, maybe six if they played their cards right, and Dinah gave her another small push towards her bed. 

“The only name you should be saying right now is mine.” Dinah said softly, her breath sweet and warm on Helena’s skin. Helena’s brain malfunctioned, she could feel the pop of wires and circuits in her head, and Dinah could have used a feather to knock Helena over. She felt utterly weightless, nothing keeping her anchored except Dinah, Dinah, Dinah. Always Dinah. Helena kissed her, tasting lemon and salt, her tongue making Helena feel faint, and Dinah kissed her back and sat her down on the bed.

Helena could do this. She wasn’t an idiot (debatable) and she wasn’t a coward. She could kiss Dinah, touch Dinah, hold Dinah. She could figure this shit out, right? How hard could it be? Dinah straddled her lap, they were face to face like this, so close Helena could feel Dinah’s heartbeat against her chest, and for a moment they just sat, looking at each other with messy hair and kiss-puffy lips. 

“Hands on my waist.” Dinah’s voice was barely a whisper, sending goosebumps prickling along Helena’s arms, and Helena put her hands on Dinah’s waist. Her shirt was cropped high enough that Helena was touching nothing but bare skin, so soft and so smooth and so fucking perfect underneath Helena’s callused fingers. “Good.” 

Dinah scraped her hair off her neck and tilted her head so the length of her throat was exposed for Helena’s mouth, long and graceful and lovely. Helena took a deep breath and let her mouth brush the vein in Dinah’s neck, the barest hint of a kiss. She could feel Dinah’s pulse against her lips, blood pounding against delicate skin, and she moved down a little further, to the place where Dinah’s neck met her shoulder, and kissed her there. Dinah shuddered, tipping her head back to give Helena better access, and Helena left her mouth where it was, hands on Dinah’s waist, breathing her in. 

“Hey.” Dinah said softly, running her knuckles along Helena’s spine. A simple, comforting gesture, her hand was warm through Helena’s shirt and Helena took a deep breath, her face buried in Dinah’s shoulder. It was so fucking nice to hold her, to feel Dinah’s comforting weight on her lap and smell lavender and know that Dinah wanted to do this. Wanted her. “Talk to me, sunshine. Use your words.” 

Helena looked up at her, this miraculous, beautiful, kind, funny, smart woman sitting on her lap in a tight gold shirt and looking at her with perfect brown eyes that saw her in ways she didn’t think were possible. Dinah had lipstick on her neck, apparently it had transferred from Dinah to Helena and back again, and she was smiling softly. Sunshine. 

“I’m nervous.” Helena said finally, her cheeks were probably the colour of Dinah’s lips by now, she could feel every single pore in her entire body and she felt weird and warm and melty in the pit of her stomach. Was she having a stroke? “I’ve never done this before. I’ve never wanted to do this before. I just want you, Dinah, and I’m so scared I’m going to mess this up.” 

“You aren’t going to mess this up.” Dinah smiled, raking her fingers through Helena’s short dark hair again. Her nails scraped Helena’s scalp in a way that had Helena arching into the touch, she felt like she’d just been struck by lightning, and Dinah kept one hand in Helena’s hair as she began to twist her rings off one by one. “Helena, it’s me. It’s not a stranger, not a new girlfriend, it’s just me. You are my best friend in the world and I have never cared about anyone the way I care about you. Let me take care of you, beautiful. Please.” 

Helena kissed the hollow of Dinah’s throat, soft and warm, and then the dip between her collarbones. She felt better, tasted better, than Helena could have ever imagined, in all her dreams she had never pictured this. Dinah’s chest moved beneath her mouth, every single one of her breaths was unsteady, and Helena fucking needed her, more than air, more than life, just the feeling of Dinah’s skin against her mouth was enough to keep her alive. It was ridiculous. How the hell did she manage to get this worked up by just kissing Dinah’s neck? 

“Can I?” Helena tucked her fingers beneath the hem of Dinah’s shirt, calluses against soft skin, and Dinah raised her arms in answer. Oh. Helena had to do it. She could barely manage with her own shirt sometimes, how was she going to get Dinah’s shirt off without making a fool of herself? Not easily, probably. The gold fabric was thin and Helena did her best to not to knock Dinah out of her lap as she peeled the shirt, inch by fucking inch, off Dinah’s torso. 

And then every single drop of blood drained out of her head when she saw that Dinah wasn’t wearing a bra. (To be fair, Helena wasn’t wearing one either, but she almost never wore bras if she could avoid it). Helena didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about boobs, she didn’t even really look at her own, the ex-Catholic in her forbade it, but Jesus Christ why hadn’t she been thinking about boobs? Holy shit. Why wasn’t everyone thinking about boobs all the time? Helena was going to from now on. Why did anyone think about anything that wasn’t boobs? 

“You’re fucking ridiculous.” Dinah laughed, taking Helena’s wrist in one hand and moving it up to her chest. Helena nearly burst into tears. Fuck. Holy fucking shit. She didn’t know how to move her hand, how to touch, how to take, and Dinah was so fucking perfect. Her skin was soft and her nipple was hard and Helena flicked her thumb over the dark skin, earning a sharp inhale. Alright. She could work with that. Helena knew how to do things and gauge reactions and go from there, she had done it with her parents and she had done it with Sal and Luca and Massimo and she could do it here, now, Dinah’s skin hot against her own. She thumbed Dinah’s nipple gently, watching it harden further, and replaced her finger with her mouth. 

Dinah swore as Helena pressed an open-mouthed kiss to her nipple, as carefully as she could manage. Did she use her teeth? Did she just kiss? Did she suck, lick, tease? Oh, god. She didn’t know how to do this, but she knew that she wanted to learn. Helena traced Dinah’s nipple with her tip of her tongue, savouring the feeling, and Dinah tugged at Helena’s hair lightly. “Use your other hand.” 

Helena did as she was told, she was good at doing what she was told, Dinah’s nipple was peaked against her palm and her skin was so fucking smooth, warm where Helena touched, soft beneath her fingers, the most perfect thing she’d ever felt. Helena’s heart felt like it was about to explode, but in a good way, not in a _eating nothing but olive oil and pasta for a good chunk of her life was about to kill her_ way. Dinah groaned, pushing into Helena’s hand and into her mouth, and Helena grazed Dinah’s nipple with her teeth. 

“You teasing me?” Dinah gave Helena’s hair another gentle tug, winding a strand around her fingers, and her gasp when Helena nipped at the skin again was the most beautiful thing Helena had ever heard. Helena could have stayed there forever, fucking worshipping Dinah’s chest with her teeth and her tongue and her hands and her lips, listening to Dinah’s shuddering breaths and gaspy little moans. 

Something hot and insistent had started to build up between Helena’s legs, a feeling she had never experienced in her life, and Dinah tapped the side of her head with two fingers. Helena pulled back just enough to look up at Dinah, sliding her hands back down to Dinah’s waist, she was probably smiling like a lunatic but it didn’t even fucking matter. Dinah smiled back, cupping Helena’s face in her hands and rubbed her thumb along Helena’s cheekbone. 

“I refuse to be the only one with my tits out.” Dinah moved her hands down to Helena’s shoulders, squeezing at the hard muscle, then down to the bottom of Helena’s turtleneck. She had a point, but no one had ever seen her without a shirt on and Helena had scars on her torso and her boobs were not as big or as nice as Dinah’s. “Lift your arms for me.” 

Helena lifted her arms. Her shirt got caught on her head and Dinah laughed, warm fingers untangling her from the narrow neck of her top, until it was finally off and Dinah tossed it beside her own. Fuck. Every single instinct was to cover herself, press an arm over her tits so Dinah couldn’t see, but Dinah gave her a gentle push down onto the bed, so Helena was laid out beneath her, and gasped mockingly. 

“Fuck, I could grate cheese on these.” Dinah ran a hand over Helena’s stomach, making Helena shudder, and splayed her fingers over the faint lines of Helena’s abs. Helena did have abs, she had always been fairly proud of them, and thin scars patterned her stomach and ribs and chest and her back, too, even though Dinah couldn’t see her back. Helena flexed her abs hard and Dinah rolled her eyes, grinning as she felt muscle tense beneath her fingers. “Show-off. This the ribcage tattoo you were telling me about? What does it mean?” 

Dinah followed the line of black ink with her finger and Helena nearly jumped out of her skin, the last time anyone had touched her there had been when she had gotten the tattoo and it had not been nearly as intimate of a touch. The tattoo on Helena’s ribs was the size of her palm, a crowned lion with three words curving beneath. “It’s the Bertinelli family symbol. Once a man in the family came of age, he got it tattooed over his heart. My mother said that tattoos on women were unbecoming, but she’s never going to see it, so.”

Helena trailed off and Dinah traced over the tattoo again, half a smile making her dimples look shallow. She was so fucking beautiful it hurt to look at her for too long, like looking at the sun, but Helena would have happily been blinded if she could have looked at Dinah for a few moments longer. There were a few reddish marks on her chest and one on the side of her neck where Helena’s mouth had been, the beginnings of bruises, and Helena flinched. She hadn’t meant to hurt Dinah. She would never, ever hurt Dinah on purpose. Fuck. Were you supposed to leave bruises on people’s necks and chests? Dinah wasn’t complaining, she hadn’t even noticed them, so she supposed it was okay. 

“What does it say?” Dinah used the edge of her short fingernail to go over the words, the scrape of them against the thin skin of Helena’s ribs sent her nerves into overdrive, and she ground her hips downwards into Helena’s when Helena didn’t answer right away. Fuck, it felt so fucking good. 

“ _Forza nei nummera_. Bertinelli family motto. Strength in numbers.” Helena moved her own hips upwards, desperate for any sort of friction to relieve that strange heat between her legs, and Dinah pressed down to get her to stay still. Dinah’s eyes darted between the tattoo and Helena’s face, as if she was asking for permission to question it. Yeah, the tattoo was a little bit ironic. The Bertinelli family had strength in numbers, and Helena was the only one left. “In hindsight, it’s pretty ridiculous.”

“It’s not ridiculous. It’s perfect.” Dinah leaned down to kiss Helena on the lips, opening Helena’s mouth with her tongue and sliding a hand between them to brush the pad of her thumb against Helena’s nipple. Fuck fuck fuck fuck. Helena arched up against Dinah as they kissed, she didn’t make a habit of grabbing her own boobs and she didn’t know how good just the feeling of Dinah’s warm fingers, callused and steady, would be. “God, you’re incredible.” 

Incredible. Dinah thought she was incredible. Helena pressed her fingers into the soft skin of Dinah’s back, right at the bottom of her spine, and if she had been more confident she would have slid a hand down the back of Dinah’s pants. She was not confident, so she left her hand where it was, fingers spread wide, and Dinah made a soft noise into Helena’s mouth at the touch. 

“ _Cazzo_.” Helena groaned when Dinah kissed just over her heart (or where she assumed the heart to be; Helena’s knowledge of human anatomy started and ended at Head and Shoulders Knees and Toes), a word Luca would normally flick her in the back of the head for saying. Luca swore violently and constantly and always got mad at Helena for cursing even when she was just repeating his words. Dinah laughed against her skin, the feeling of warm breath on her chest practically had Helena in convulsions, and closed her lips around Helena’s nipple. 

She was not particularly gifted in the tit department, the only thing puberty had given her was eleven inches in height and a lot of stretch marks, but Dinah didn’t even seem to notice how small Helena’s boobs were in comparison, she licked Helena’s nipples and kissed every single inch of her chest, every touch of her lips made Helena’s body sing. Dinah’s mouth was warm and soft and perfect, her fingers moving with the same easy grace as they had with the chopsticks, leaving trails of goosebumps in their wake. 

“Helena.” Dinah licked a stripe up between her boobs, all the way up to the hollow of Helena’s throat, and she kissed Helena’s chin gently, her chest moving against Helena’s in a way that made another wave of heat flare between Helena’s legs. “Look at me, beautiful.” 

Helena looked at Dinah. Her hair was mussed and her lips were swollen and her eyes were bright, she was the most perfect woman that had ever existed, and Helena pulled her in for another scalding kiss. Dinah kissed her back for a moment and then she bit down on Helena’s bottom lip gently and pulled away. 

“There is nothing I would like to do more than kiss you senseless, sunshine, I promise, but if we keep this up I’m going to have to throw out these underwear. And they were like, really fucking expensive.” Dinah flashed her dimples, her mouth an inch away from Helena’s. All Helena knew was Dinah, the heat of her body and the kindness of her eyes and the scent of her skin. All Helena wanted to know was Dinah, but, like, biblically. “Can I show you?” 

“Show me everything.” Helena said, running her hands down Dinah’s sides to the waist of her tight blue pants. She didn’t know much, about sex or love or women or life in general, but she knew that she wanted this so badly it hurt. “Please, Dinah.” 

“Since you said please.” Dinah got to her feet, nearly making Helena groan at the loss of her, and kicked her socks off before undoing her pants and beginning to slide them down her legs. Helena watched, hypnotized, as Dinah revealed two perfectly toned thighs and a pair of white lace underwear. Every single coherent thought left Helena’s brain so quickly she nearly got whiplash and Dinah tossed her pants into the heap of discarded clothing. Holy fucking shit. “You gotta tell me if we need to stop, beautiful. I don’t want to do anything that makes you uncomfortable.” 

“I’m good. I’m fucking fantastic, actually.” Helena’s eyes were glued to Dinah’s hips, the bits of brown skin visible through the lace were practically begging to be touched, and Dinah laughed, the sound as soft and warm as her skin. “They should put you in a museum or something. What’s that thing that’s like a museum but for art?”

Dinah wrapped herself back around Helena, lace against denim, bare chest against bare chest, and she bit Helena’s earlobe gently as she pulled Helena on top of her on the bed. “An art gallery?” 

“Yeah. That.” Helena nearly burst into flames when she felt Dinah’s teeth against her ear, she squeezed her thighs together so she didn’t have to think about the growing pressure between them, and for a minute she stayed where she was, propped up on her elbows over Dinah’s body, gazing at Dinah with what were no doubt very sappy eyes. She was allowed to be sappy. Dinah cared about her and Dinah understood her complete lack of game and Dinah saw her, saw the shell of a girl beneath too much dark eyeshadow and a scowl, and didn’t care for her any less because of it. Dinah saw her flaws and her weaknesses and her mistakes and her constant, unrelenting rage, and didn’t hate her for it. She had already committed most of Dinah’s face to memory, the curve of her lips and the crinkles around her eyes and the slope of her forehead, but she studied Dinah all the same, as if to memorize the way her nose ring made her sparse freckles stand out and how her the lipstick had left red smudges along her mouth. 

“I like it when you look at me like that.” Dinah said softly, her fingers playing along Helena’s cheek. Was this much face-touching supposed to happen during sex? Helena was not complaining, but she didn’t want to weird Dinah out or anything. “I think it’s the happiest I’ve ever seen you. Sometimes I’d catch you looking at me and you had this look on your face, this lightness. Like you weren’t angry when you looked at me.”

“I’m never angry when I look at you. You make me happy.” Helena swallowed hard, she was not very good at these romantic speeches or whatever but she knew that Dinah made her happier than she’d ever been in her entire life. Dinah tucked some of Helena’s hair behind her ear, her smile made another flicker of heat pound between Helena’s legs, and kissed her gently. 

“Oh, man, my underwear is fucked.” Dinah breathed when they broke apart, grinding her hips up into Helena’s. Helena groaned at the contact, fucking hell, and held herself up with one hand while her other skimmed Dinah’s waist. Dinah pushed herself into Helena’s touch, her skin was so smooth and so soft and Helena’s fingers caught on the edge of Dinah’s underwear. “I want them off.” 

Helena tucked her thumbs beneath the lace, it was a good thing she had a very strong core because it was the only thing holding her up, and Dinah gave her a reassuring nod. She lifted her hips so Helena could tug her underwear down, off those never-ending legs and onto the floor. Now Dinah was naked, the perfect curves of her brown skin bared to Helena’s eyes and Helena’s touch, if she could work up the courage to touch her. Fuck. Dinah took Helena’s hand in hers, lacing their fingers together for a moment, and then she guided Helena down between her legs. 

Jesus Christ. Dinah was soft and warm and slick beneath Helena’s shaking fingers and Dinah released her hand, probably to let Helena get used to the feeling. Helena didn’t know what to do. Did she rub, stroke, push, oh fucking hell, she didn’t even have an inkling of what to do. Apparently Dinah knew that, though, because she pressed a soft kiss to Helena’s jaw and rolled her hips. 

“I trust you, sunshine.” Dinah said into the space where Helena’s neck met her jaw, just above her pulse, and she ground up into Helena’s hand again as if to prove her point. Helena used a single finger to stroke at her gently, Dinah was so hot and so wet and it was all for her, for Helena, this was for her and no one else. “That’s it.” 

Helena curled a single finger into Dinah and Dinah gasped, her hips jerking upwards to meet Helena’s touch. Alright. She could work with that. Helena had always been a very quick study, and she pushed her finger deeper to see how Dinah would react. Her stomach twisted when Dinah groaned, all molten heat and desperate hunger, and she pressed a sloppy kiss to Dinah’s lips. 

“More.” Dinah said into Helena’s mouth, her hand fumbling along the hard muscles of Helena’s stomach, and Helena obliged her. Two fingers, then, moving at a steady pace, and Dinah fucking moaned against Helena’s lips, lemon and salt brushing Helena’s tongue. She hadn’t thought Dinah could get more beautiful, but somehow she managed, her hips jerking underneath Helena’s touch and her skin hot against Helena’s own. “Oh, god, just like that.” 

Helena kissed her again and again, getting her fingers into an easy rhythm as she covered Dinah’s face and neck in kisses. Every single time her lips brushed Dinah’s skin it got a little easier, her heart was still threatening to jump ship but Dinah made her feel safe, her breathless moans were fucking music to Helena’s ears. She monitored Dinah’s reactions carefully, adjusting the movements of her fingers accordingly, and while she could have done this until the pads of her fingers were pruney like they got after a bath, Dinah dug her nails into Helena’s shoulder and pulled her close. 

“Fuck, Helena.” Dinah clamped down on Helena’s hand, crying out as her entire body arched upwards and she pressed their foreheads together, hips rolling against Helena’s touch. What was she doing? Had Helena hurt her? Her shoulder blade prickled, pain and pleasure, and Dinah shuddered and sagged back into the bed. Huh. Helena pulled her fingers away, making Dinah pout at her, and the two fingers that had been inside Dinah were slick up to the knuckle. Dinah’s face was flushed and she looked happy, her chest heaving against Helena’s. 

Without really knowing what she was doing, Helena brought the two fingers to her mouth and sucked them clean. Dinah tasted as sweet as she felt and her eyes widened as she watched Helena lick her fingers. Fuck. Were you not supposed to do this? Helena didn’t know exactly how things worked, but it had felt like the right (well, not the wrong) thing to do. And Dinah tasted so fucking good, and when Helena pulled her fingers out of her mouth with a pop Dinah’s own mouth dropped open. 

“That was the hottest fucking thing I’ve ever seen in my life.” Dinah said, scooting out from beneath Helena’s body and propping herself up on her elbows. Helena relaxed slightly, she was still very tense but feeling Dinah come undone because of her was helping. “How the hell did you know to do that?” 

“Felt right, I guess.” Helena shrugged, she had mostly forgotten she was still wearing her jeans and they were now rubbing uncomfortably against her skin. Was this odd, molten heat between her legs the same thing she had just sucked off her fingers? That seemed right. Helena leaned back on her heels, nearly tipping off the edge of the bed, and Dinah laughed and sat up. “I, uh, what do I do now?” 

“Now I want you to lie back and let me be good to you, sunshine.” Dinah’s voice was teasing, eyes bright, and every drop of moisture left Helena’s mouth. Fuck. The idea of letting Dinah undo her pants, slipping her hands beneath, underneath the soft fabric of her boxers to a place that Helena herself refused to touch, made her skin crawl. Fuck. Dinah must have recognized the fear in Helena’s eyes because she took Helena’s hand in both of her own and rubbed her knuckles gently. “If you want me to. We don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.” 

“I want to.” Helena swallowed hard, trying to keep her tongue from drying out, and forced herself to look Dinah in the eyes. “I just haven’t ever, y’know, um…” 

“I know. I don’t want you to be scared, Helena.” Dinah kissed the back of Helena’s hand, then each one of her fingertips, gentle and soft and intimate. Helena wasn’t used to intimacy, it was stomach-churning in a good way and it made that weird feeling between her thighs burn even hotter. “It’s just me, okay? I don’t hurt you, you don’t hurt me. I don’t lie to you, you don’t lie to me. I got you, sunshine, and you got me.”

Helena lay down on her back, careful not to accidentally concuss herself on the headboard. She had Dinah, and Dinah had her. She trusted Dinah, with everything she had, and Dinah was not going to hurt her. Dinah cared about her. She wasn’t going to judge her, shame her, any of that shit. None of it. Dinah kissed her again, slow and sweet, tracing the newest scar on Helena’s stomach as she kissed down the side of Helena’s neck. 

This was okay. Helena trusted Dinah. She cared about Dinah so much it hurt and she wanted Dinah to be able to do this, to be able to undo her jeans and slide the zipper down to expose the waistband of the boxers Harley had picked out. Harley might suck, but she did have excellent taste in underwear. She had selected the most expensive pair Helena owned, black with gold detailing on the waist, an Italian brand that Renee had recommended, and Dinah clicked her tongue approvingly. 

“Hips up, beautiful.” Dinah pulled Helena’s jeans down her thighs, they were tight enough that they got stuck at her knees, and Helena swore. Fucking hell, how did Dinah manage to get her clothes off with no issue and Helena had gotten tangled up in both her shirt and her pants? Dinah laughed, tugging at the tight denim until her pants were all the way off. “I was right.” 

“About what?” Helena wanted to tuck her knees up to her chest, curl up in a ball like she was a child, but she wasn’t a child and she wanted this as badly as Dinah did and so she left her legs where they were, hard and pale and flecked with scars, her thighs had never seen the sun and it was obvious, and Dinah was looking at her like she was the most beautiful thing in the world, like how she looked at Dinah, and Helena felt that rush of warmth in her heart and between her legs at the same time. 

“You do have great legs.” Dinah trailed her fingers over the skin just above Helena’s underwear, making Helena shiver, and she looked at Helena for confirmation that it was okay to keep going before she pulled Helena’s boxers down too. And now she was naked and Dinah was also naked and they were naked in the same bed. Oh, fuck. Dinah kissed both of her collarbones, then lower, down Helena’s chest and along her stomach. Dinah’s lips were soft and steady and she kissed Helena’s navel, a moan escaping Helena’s mouth. Fuck, it felt so nice, and Dinah was going to take care of her and be good to her and she cared for Dinah and Dinah cared for her. 

“Fuck, you’re wet.” Dinah said, pressing an open-mouthed kiss to the hollow of Helena’s hip. Was she not supposed to be? No, Dinah had been wet. Was it a good thing or a bad thing? A good thing, right? It felt good, but lots of bad things felt good. Dinah kissed her other hip, gently, and then moved her mouth down to the inside of Helena’s thigh. “All for me?” 

Dinah scraped her teeth along Helena’s inner thigh when she didn’t answer, soothing the sting with a flick of her tongue, and Jesus Dinah hadn’t even touched her properly yet and she was already shaking with need. Helena gasped, digging her fingers into her comforter, as Dinah ran the tip of her tongue along the place where Helena needed it most, where Helena refused to touch ever. Fuck fuck fuck fuck. 

She had lost every word in every language except Dinah’s name, repeating it over and over and over as Dinah kissed her, licked her, touched her, tasted her. This was new and it was strange and it was fucking perfect, just the sight of that blonde head between her legs had Helena arching off the sheets. She felt like she’d been set on fire, like something hot and desperate and hungry had woken up inside her at the first stroke of Dinah’s tongue, electricity shot through her nerves and her body fucking sung, wild and untamed and wonderful. 

“Dinah.” Her voice was barely a whimper, which was fairly pathetic, she didn’t like feeling pathetic but she liked feeling Dinah’s mouth and she liked Dinah’s hands on her hips. Dinah looked up at her, eyes bright, and Helena nearly fell to pieces at the way Dinah looked at her. Helena took a deep breath, felt it rattle around in her chest, and something at the bottom of her stomach tightened. “I-”

“It’s okay, sunshine.” Dinah said, her breath soft and warm against Helena’s skin, and her tongue was fucking magical, doing things to Helena she couldn’t understand. “I’m here. I’m right here.” 

Helena let loose a string of profanity that would have made Luca blush as she shattered, her entire body arching off the bed and her legs shaking while something utterly foreign and fantastic washed over her. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, couldn’t move, all she could do was say Dinah’s name and come undone against her mouth. Oh god, oh god, oh god. 

“You have lipstick on your teeth.” Dinah propped her chin in her hands, her hair spread over Helena’s thighs and a bright smile on her face. Shit. There was lipstick on Dinah’s face and if her mouth was smudged with it that meant the inside of Helena’s thighs had to have smears as well and Helena laughed, it was all she could do. 

Fucking hell. People should just have sex all the time. Why did people ever stop having sex? She had never felt like this in her entire life, lying here with Dinah, coming down off the best thing she’d ever experienced, secure in the knowledge that Dinah cared about her and she cared about Dinah. Dinah kissed her, body warm and soft and comforting against Helena’s. She could have kissed Dinah forever, pressed together on her bed, but Dinah nudged her nose against Helena’s and pulled away.

“I need a shower.” Dinah sat up, stretching her arms up above her head, and Helena wanted to watch her until her eyes bled. God, she was so beautiful, the most beautiful woman in the entire universe, and she got off the bed with a grin that lit up Helena’s world. Helena just stared, the tattoo on Dinah’s back shifting as she started for Helena’s bathroom, and she paused in the doorway. “That was an invitation, sunshine.” 

Oh. _Oh_. Helena fell off her bed in her hurry to catch up, hitting the floor with a very embarrassing thud, and Dinah’s laughter was the sweetest sound she’d ever heard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> dedicated to the burps of prey groupchat on tumblr because our collective thirst for mary elizabeth winstead sustains me.


	11. xi: coronavirus? we don't know her

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harley has less than zero chill at any given moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> unedited

Helena woke up when her phone rang. Well, more accurately, she woke up when Dinah ran her tongue over the very sensitive skin of her earlobe, but Dinah was kissing her ear so she’d wake up and answer her phone, so it was close enough. 

“Someone is calling you.” Dinah whispered, her teeth scraping the shell of Helena’s ear, and Helena had never hated her fucking cellphone more. Dinah lay behind her, her arms wrapped around Helena’s waist and their legs tucked together, holding her close. It was so fucking lovely to be held, to feel Dinah’s body curved against her own, to have slept in the arms of someone she cared about and who cared for her. “Maybe you should answer.” 

Helena groaned, fumbling around on her nightstand until she found her phone and checked the screen. Fucking hell. It was Sunday, and she always called them on the first and third Sundays of the month, in the morning for her because it was after church for them, but Dinah had kept her up until three in the morning and she hadn’t called. Shit. “Hello.” 

“ _Hi, piccola vespa_.” Massimo said, even through the tinny speakers his quiet voice was a comfort, and Helena blew out a breath, holding her phone to her ear. “ _You didn’t call and Sal got worried. He wants to know if you’re fine. Are you fine_?” 

“ _Yes_.” Helena called them twice a month, mindful of the time difference, talked to Massimo for two minutes, Luca for five minutes, and Sal for five minutes, told them she missed them and would come visit soon, and left it at that. None of them were much for small talk, and even the short conversations every other week were stilted. “ _I’m fine. I was asleep._ ” 

“ _I can call back later_.”

“ _I’m up now_.”

“ _If you say so._ ” She and Massimo had never needed to talk, they very rarely did, and it was always the same stilted back and forth. Helena might have told him about Dinah, but they didn’t talk about that kind of stuff. They talked about motorcycles and fighting and how to best bother Luca, and that was it. “ _You getting on alright_?”

“ _Yes. You_?”

“ _Same as always. New tattoo_.” 

“ _Nice. Me too._ ” 

“ _Somewhere you can hide it from Patri_?” 

“ _I’m twenty-four. I’m allowed to have a tattoo_.” 

“ _You’re always going to be nine years old to him_.” 

“ _I know._ ” Helena sighed, wrapping her fingers around Dinah’s wrist before her hand could slip beneath the waist of Helena’s sweatpants. No matter how many times Helena kicked Massimo’s ass, no matter how much taller than him she was, no matter how often she reminded him, Luca would forever see her as the quiet, blood-stained girl his oldest son had dragged home from America. 

“ _You need anything? Arrows, a new helmet, anything_?” 

“ _No, I’m good._ ” 

“ _Okay. You need anything at all, just tell me_.” Another voice in the background, raspier, and Massimo made the noise he always made when he was annoyed. Dinah kissed the back of Helena’s neck, how she managed to smell so fucking good as soon as she woke up in the morning was beyond her, and Helena shuddered. “ _Patri wants to talk to you. Miss you, piccola vespa. Come see us soon._ ”

“ _I’ll try. Miss you too, Massi._ ” Helena listened to the phone being yanked away from Massimo and rolled her eyes, Luca barely knew how cellphones worked but he was also forever snatching the phone away from Massimo and Sal to scream into it. “ _Hi, Luca_.” 

“ _Piccola morte! You didn’t call this morning._ ” Luca had two tones, one was his angry yelling and one was his not displeased yelling, they sounded almost exactly the same but fifteen years of listening to him day in and day out meant Helena could tell the difference immediately. “ _Are you hurt?_ ” 

“ _I’m fine. Late night_.” 

“ _You are going on dates_?” 

Well, fuck. Halfway around the goddamn world and he still knew exactly what she was doing at any given moment. He was good at that, when she had been young he had yelled at her for misbehaving when she was halfway across the farm, and she inhaled sharply when Dinah kissed the top of her spine. “ _No. I’m too busy. You know that_.” 

“ _I don’t know what you get up to, piccola morte. Maybe you’re out on the town, dating lots of men at once._ ” 

“ _Dio cane. I promise, Luca, I am not dating lots of men at once. I am dating no men at all._ ”

“ _Good. I cannot kick their asses from all the way over here. You are good, yes? You do not need anything?_ ” 

“ _I’m good. I don’t need anything. I-”_ Dinah pressed an open-mouthed kiss to the small of Helena’s back and Helena’s breath caught in her throat, she made a noise she did not need to make while on the phone with Luca, and she curled away from Dinah’s lips so she could keep a level head. _“I’m alright. Thank you.”_

“ _Always, mi Helena. Sal is not home, but he told me to tell you if you do not come and visit soon or he will come and see you._ ” 

“ _I will try. I miss you and I miss Sal too._ ” 

“ _We miss you more, piccola morte. Don’t forget to call again. It worries Massimo_.” 

“ _Of course_.” It worried Luca, he just refused to say it, and Helena fought to keep her voice steady as Dinah traced the length of her spine with her tongue. Jesus fucking Christ. “ _I won’t forget. Goodbye, Luca.”_

Helena hung up because Luca didn’t know how, tossing her phone across the room and rolling over to face Dinah. Her phone smacked the opposite wall and Helena heard glass crack, but Dinah was looking at her with soft eyes and a teasing grin and Helena parted her lips, letting Dinah cup her face in her hands. Her kiss made Helena’s stomach melt and Dinah spat, gently, caringly, into her mouth. Helena swallowed, leaning up into Dinah’s touch, and hoped that would be enough for her to do it again. 

Dinah did it again and this time Helena’s entire body arched, in theory the idea of her mouth being spit in was fucking disgusting but Dinah did it with such genuine affection that Helena almost begged her for more. She didn’t beg, because that would be way too overwhelming, but she opened her mouth and let Dinah spit onto her tongue. Jesus, how was this making her sweaty? It was objectively very gross. It was not gross in practice, though and Dinah licked the seam of Helena’s lips softly, leaving a trail of spit in her wake.

She had barely taken her lips off Dinah’s at all last night, they had managed to use up every single bit of Helena’s hot water and then spent nearly an hour underneath the ice-cold spray, until Dinah’s teeth were chattering and Helena had lost all feeling in her fingers and toes. For a very long time, she had felt like they were the only two people in the entire universe, as if nothing mattered but her figuring out every single way to make Dinah moan, and the only reason she had stopped worshipping Dinah was because by three in the morning she had started to feel genuinely light-headed. 

“I like when you speak Sicilian.” Dinah traced Helena’s lips gently, her face was still heavy with sleep and she was the most beautiful woman that had ever existed and would ever exist. “I like it even better when you speak Sicilian and you’ve got bedhead.” 

Oh, dammit. Helena reached up to run her fingers through her hair, she hadn’t given a single bit of thought to the fact that she normally woke up with every strand of her hair sticking up on end, but Dinah caught her hand and laced their fingers together. “Leave it. It’s cute. How’d you sleep?” 

“Really well.” Helena kissed the back of Dinah’s hand. She didn’t think she’d ever had a better night’s sleep in her life. Dinah grinned, pressed her lips to the tip of Helena’s nose, and combed a lock of hair off Helena’s forehead. “You?” 

“I told you. I sleep better when you’re with me. It was mostly me trying to get in your pants, but you make me feel safe.” 

“My pants don’t fit you.” 

Dinah laughed, smoothing out one of Helena’s eyebrows with her thumb. Was there something Helena was missing? Helena’s pants were too long for Dinah, not to mention the fact that Dinah was all curves and Helena was built like a stick insect with hair. “Never mind. Do you-” 

“Good morning, lovebirds of prey!” 

Oh, Helena was going to push Harley out of a fucking window. She groaned and pulled the comforters up over her head, meaning her feet were sticking out the bottom. Did they make extra-long blankets? They should. Helena should look into it. Jesus, hadn’t she put the chain on the fucking door? If Harley had broken the chain on her door, Helena was going to push her out of two windows. 

“Night go well?” Helena couldn’t see her, but she knew that Harley was waggling her eyebrows at the two of them. Oh, thank god they were both partially clothed (partially being the operative word, Helena was wearing nothing but a pair of ratty grey sweatpants and Dinah had on a tank top that barely hit her upper thigh. Was Cass there? Cass was already scarred for life, but she didn’t need to see Helena and Dinah half-naked. There were limits. “I didn’t think you were the type to put out on the first date, Crossbow Killer.” 

“Go fuck yourself.” Dinah said and Helena shoved herself deeper under the comforter. Maybe if she was really still Harley would go away; Harley had the attention span of a hyperactive toddler and had once not noticed Helena for nearly twenty minutes because she was playing with a hot pink sequin. “What do you want? We’re busy. And if you ask to join, I will scream so loud your single brain cell is going to leak out of your ears.”

“Buzzkill. Cass wants to have lunch and she wants you two to come. I told her she’d be interrupting but you know she doesn’t listen to me.” That was true, the only person Cass really listened to was Renee and that was only under duress. She did the opposite of what she was told, honestly, and they had tried and failed to reverse-psychology Cass into listening to them. “I made her wait outside though, cause I figured you were either starting, finishing, or in the middle of fucking.” 

“God, you’re a pervert.” Dinah said, Helena’s bed creaking as she shifted. Helena’s bed, which was not very sturdy to begin with, had been pushed within an inch of its life last night, (to be fair, she had built it from a kit that was entirely in Swedish and broken two of her fingernails) she might need to get a new one soon. A mattress that wasn’t pulled off the street would probably help, too. 

“Yeah, but you love me. Put some pants on so she can come in. I don’t need the kid gettin’ robbed because Crossbow lives in a building full of criminals.” Harley tugged at Helena’s ankle, her fingers ice-cold, and Helena kicked out at her aimlessly. Apparently the universe did not want her to sleep in with Dinah. Rude. 

“I don’t live in a building full of criminals.” 

“Three people tried to mug me while we were coming up the stairs.” 

“I don’t even think three people live here, period. Can you turn around so I can get up?” 

“Why? You’ve got a great rack.” 

“Oh my god.” Helena buried her face in her pillow, cheeks flaming. Jesus Christ, she did not need anyone talking about her rack, let alone Harley fucking Quinn. Harley laughed, that manic giggle that meant she wasn’t quite serious, and Helena groaned. “For real. Just for a second, please?” 

“You’re no fun.” Harley pouted, but she turned around to face the opposite wall. Thank fuck. It occured to Helena fairly suddenly that Dinah had no clothes here except for the ones that had peeled off her last night, which were inside-out on the floor. Shit. “I’m gonna take this to mean your date went well?”

“Nah, it sucked.” Dinah got out of bed, the hem of her shirt riding up over her thighs, and Helena frowned. It sucked? Dinah had said it was the best date she’d ever been on. Had she lied? Did Dinah not—sarcasm. Right. Harley snorted, climbing up onto the back of Helena’s couch without turning around and propping her dirty shoes on the cushion. Gross. “Anything off limits, sunshine, or can I wear what I want?” 

“You’re good.” Helena got dressed as quickly as she could, taking the clothes that Dinah handed her with a grateful smile. She could spend the rest of her life thanking Dinah, for every single second that they had ever spent together and ever would spend together, but that would probably be pretty creepy, so she just belted her ripped jeans at the waist and did up the last button of her shirt. 

“Can I let Cass in now?” Harley whined, kicking her heels impatiently. Fuck, she was the least patient person Helena had ever met. “What if she died out in the hall and it’s your fault? I’ll make sure she haunts you forever.” 

“Cass isn’t dead in the hallway.” Dinah, who was wearing a pair of Helena’s cropped jeans and a pale blue shirt that Helena never, ever wore because she would sooner die than wear light colours, rolled her eyes. Helena’s heart skipped a beat when she saw Dinah in her clothes, which was no fucking fair, and she dragged her fingers through her hair as she stared. “I’m dressed and so is H, so you’re good.” 

“Kid! They’re decent!” Harley yelled, so loud it made Helena flinch, and Cass’s scowl as she shut the door behind her could have killed. She looked fucking pissed, but it wasn’t like Harley hadn’t warned her she’d be interrupting. And Cass was never interrupting, really, she was the coolest kid Helena had ever met, so it was fine. If it was just Harley busting down the door to bug them, Helena would have kicked her out and jammed a chair under the doorknob and probably booted her ass down the stairs for good measure. 

“I’m gonna vomit.” Cass grumbled, immediately walking over to Helena’s fridge and beginning to rifle through it. Weren’t they going out for lunch? Cass apparently didn’t care, because she had removed the only spoon Helena owned from the drawer and begun to scrape the edges of the mostly-empty jar of fluff. 

“Canary, go brush your teeth. I don’t need to smell Helena’s-”

“I am begging you to shut up.” 

“Never. It’s my god-given right to be gross.” Harley laughed, ignoring the violent red now painting Helena’s cheeks, and ate a bite of fluff. “I’m serious, though. And get Crossbow to run a comb through that mop. Don’t need to go out with her electrocuted-lookin’ ass.” 

How bad was her hair, really? Helena joined Dinah at the bathroom counter, examining her reflection between the massive cracks running through the mirror. She was strangely proud of those cracks, despite the fact that it was hard to see through them, because last night she had coaxed a genuine canary cry from Dinah with her tongue. (Twice, though Dinah refused to admit it). 

“I was going to make you breakfast.” Dinah was using Helena’s toothbrush, which would have been gross had it not been so hot, and she was the most beautiful woman in the entire world. It felt right, standing side-by-side with Dinah in her bathroom, Dinah wearing her clothes, using her toothbrush, smiling at her in the cracked mirror. She spat into the sink exactly how she’d spit into Helena’s mouth and Helena’s stomach tightened. “Are you okay, sunshine? I can ask them to leave if you want. Cass might be pissed, but she’d get it.” 

“No, I’m okay.” Helena shook her head, taking her toothbrush from Dinah and sticking it in her own mouth. “Just a little tired, I think. Happy, though. Really happy.” 

“Yeah?” Dinah began to wind her hair up into a bun, lifting her eyebrows at Helena. Her dimples were the best thing Helena had ever seen, she would have kissed them had her mouth not been full of toothpaste, and they deepened as she looked at Helena. “Me too, even though I couldn’t make you breakfast. I can’t believe how lucky I am to have you in my life.” 

“I’m gonna barf!” Cass called and Helena, who had been about to say something way less poetic in the same vein, settled for spitting into the sink before pressing her lips to Dinah’s cheek. Harley was cackling, loudly enough that Renee could probably fucking hear her, and Dinah rolled her eyes wide. 

“You busted in here knowing full well what we were doing, Cassandra Cain! This is on you!” Dinah yelled back, turning to Helena and kissing her properly. Helena laughed against her mouth, cupping the back of Dinah’s neck in her hand, and she could have kissed Dinah forever and ever amen had Cass not started shrieking behind them. Jesus. Helena let go of Dinah and craned her neck at Cass, who had come up to the bathroom door and begun clawing at her own eyes dramatically. 

“Harley! Help! I’m blind! Oh, fuck, I can’t see! Where’s the bleach!” 

“Why do you need bleach if you’re already blind?” Dinah rested a hand on her hip, sucking her teeth as she watched Cass continue her routine. 

“To scrub my brain so I can forget ever having seen that.” 

“Oh my god, you came in here. Also, we are adults. Adults are allowed to kiss each other.” 

“Really? Helena’s an adult?” 

“I’m twenty-four.” Helena grumbled, turning back to the mirror and picking up her brush. Her hair was a fucking mess, sticking up in every direction and making her look like she’d just run through a windstorm. Jesus. She needed a haircut, her hair was nearly brushing her shoulders, but Helena was fairly certain if she made Cass or Harley wait any longer they’d start scratching up the wall like Bruce. “That’s an adult.” 

“Oh, leave them be, kid.” Harley appeared in the doorway too, slinging an arm around Cass’s shoulders and wiggling her eyebrows at Dinah and Helena. Dinah rolled her eyes, running her fingers through her own hair, and pressed a soft kiss to Helena’s jaw. “You’re going to grow up and make mushy faces at someone you like one day. Let Canary get her shit rocked if that’s what she wants.” 

“Jesus.” Dinah groaned, slipping both arms around Helena’s waist and kissing her face again. Helena nearly dropped the brush, Dinah’s lips could make her forget every single thing she knew, and Cass made another disgusted noise. What the hell did shit rocked mean? Something gross, probably. It was always something gross with Harley. “There is a kid here. Can you keep it PG-13?” 

“No. Never. Can we go get lunch now? I’m starving.” 

“You are the whiniest person I’ve ever met in my entire life.” 

“And you love me. Let’s go.” 

Half an hour later, packed into a booth in Cass’s favourite Mexican place, Helena watched Harley fit an entire taco in her mouth and wondered if Harley was, like, good. Probably not, but whatever. She hadn’t choked to death yet. 

“I’m just saying.” Harley said, chewing violently as she spoke. “School is like, super overrated. I mean, Crossbow didn’t finish school and look at her! Perfectly intelligent and well-adjusted.” 

Helena snorted into her water. She was many things, but intelligent and well-adjusted were not one of them. It wasn’t all chalked up to her lack of formal education (the residual trauma of her family being shot dead in front of her was not helpful for becoming a normal person) but not going to school hadn’t been good for her. They’d been having an argument for the past ten minutes about whether or not Cass should go back to school, apparently you had to register before the next school year started, and it was not going well. Shocker. 

“You finished school.” Dinah jabbed her fork in Harley’s general direction, she was firmly on team Cass should go back to school and her thigh was resting against Helena’s in a way that meant that Helena couldn’t think about anything but the feeling of their legs pressed together. “You have a fucking doctorate. You don’t want that for Cass?” 

“School is dumb.” Cass muttered around a mouthful of burrito, scowling hard at Dinah. Helena agreed with her there, school was super dumb, but she should still probably go. Cass was in what, seventh grade? What grade was fourteen? Helena didn’t know. “I get bored.” 

“You get bored with everything. You gotta get at least your high school done, Cass. I want to see you with a diploma.” Dinah ate one of Helena’s nachos. The mega nacho, with a big piece of chicken and some sour cream on it, and Helena would have complained had Dinah not hooked her foot around Helena’s ankle and smiled. Damn that fucking smile. Making Helena give up her mega nacho and shit. 

“Helena doesn’t have a diploma.” Cass made a grab for Dinah’s margarita and frowned when Dinah batted her hand away. It was a solid deflection, if Helena was being honest, but it was also not fucking fair. “She dropped outta fourth grade and is, like, a fucking millionaire now.” 

“That’s not cause she dropped out. It’s cause her parents were fuckin’ loaded.” Harley’s eyes darted to Helena for a moment before returning to her tacos. “May they rest in peace, Crossbow.” 

“Thanks.” Helena cracked a chip in half, tapping her foot against Dinah’s gently. “You should still go back to school, Cass. Just because I didn’t go to school doesn’t mean you shouldn’t.” 

“See! Two against one.” Dinah stole another one of Helena’s nachos, not a mega one this time, and Cass scowled. 

“Two against two.” 

“Nah, nah, nah. You’re under eighteen. You don’t get a say.” 

“That’s not fair.” 

“Life’s not fair. Montoya wants you back in school, too. She told me.” 

“She didn’t tell you.” 

“Don’t talk back to me.” Dinah waggled her finger at Cass, her stern voice was doing something to Helena she didn’t quite understand and she didn’t really want to understand. Jesus. Did she need Dinah to use that voice on her? First the spitting in her mouth, now this? Was Helena good? 

Harley, who had finished cramming her last taco into her mouth, looked between Cass and Dinah with her cheeks bulging. Christ, this was weird. Cass and Dinah were glaring at each other over plates of Mexican food and Harley was shoving tacos in her mouth faster than should be possible and Helena was focusing very hard on Dinah’s leg against her own. Weird, but not bad weird. Just weird. 

“What about homework?” 

“Me and Montoya and Helena and Harley will help you out.” 

“Who’s gonna take me?” 

“You have legs. Helena and I will take you if it rains or something.”

“Parent-teacher interviews?” 

“Me and Helena.” 

“What if I want to have friends over?” 

“Take ‘em to Montoya’s. She’s got a backyard and shit. Anything else?” 

Cass took a massive bite of burrito, stalling for time, and Helena nearly jumped out of her skin when Dinah took her hand. Soft and warm, long fingers laced with hers, Dinah squeezed gently, resting their twined fingers on top of Helena’s thigh and cocked an eyebrow at Cass. 

“I guess not.” Cass said finally, swallowing her food. She looked pissed as all hell, but if she was going to go back to school, she could be pissed. It was a good idea, honestly, Cass could use a bit more stability, and Helena rubbed her thumb along Dinah’s knuckles. Holding hands was so nice. Why hadn’t she known how nice it was to hold people’s hands before? Why didn’t she and Dinah just hold hands constantly? They should. “But if I have to get my diploma, so does Helena.” 

“What? No.” Helena said, looking up from her nachos. That was not part of the deal. She didn’t want to go back to school. She was too old. She wasn’t allowed. The idea of sitting in a classroom, twenty-four among ten-year olds, made bile rise in her throat. “I can’t. I’m old.” 

“You can get a GED.” Harley said, spraying bits of lettuce and tortilla all over her plate. What the fuck was a GED? Sounded dumb. “A general education degree, Crossbow. It’s this thing you can get that’s like a diploma, but not. It’s not a bad idea, honestly. You’d need to study, a lot, but you could do it. Oh, I could help you! I’m a doctor!” 

“Why do I need one?” Helena traced the thin scar on the back of Dinah’s hand, even Dinah’s fingers against her own had her sweating, and looked at Harley. Harley was rarely comprehensible, she talked very quickly and her accent was hard for Helena to understand, but over the past year it had grown steadily easier for Helena to absorb what she was actually saying. It wasn’t perfect, but she could normally piece together a full sentence from Harley’s rapid-fire hollering. 

“Cause I’m not going back to school unless you get your GED.” Cass crossed her arms over her chest, spilling rice from her burrito, and gave Helena a smug look she had picked up from Harley. Jesus, this kid was good. How dare she take advantage of the fact that Helena would do anything for her? 

“Nice one.” Harley gave Cass a high five, then turned to Helena with an identical expression on her face. Now she was being double-teamed? No fair. She looked at Dinah for help, eyes wide, and Dinah laughed. 

“Your call, sunshine.” Dinah stole a chip with the hand not twined with Helena’s and shrugged, the hard muscle of her bicep brushing against Helena’s arm. Helena swallowed hard, cracking another chip in half and eating the smaller half. “But Harley, as dumb as she might be, has a point. GEDs aren’t bad to have. Just in case.” 

Helena sighed. This was a lot for one day. She and Dinah were one thing, Luca and Massimo were another, and now a GED? Christ. Dinah squeezed her hand again, she had finished her food and was now working on Helena’s, and Helena groaned. “Fine. But I want good marks from you, Cassandra. You hear me?” 

“I’d take you way more seriously if you didn’t have like, seven hickeys and Dinah didn’t look like she was about to give you another one.” Cass took another big bite of burrito, grinning with bits of rice on her face, and Helena’s cheeks burned so hot it was any wonder they didn’t catch on fire. Fuck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is for kate thanks for putting me in baby jail so i could finish it.


	12. (i don't know the roman numerals at this point): helena bertinelli, softie.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> helena reads a book and has some feelings. she also gets held at gunpoint.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the delay quarantine is NOT treating me well.

“This is boring.” 

“You sound like Cass. It’s not boring. It’s important.” 

“Things can be important and boring. This is one of those things.” 

“Can’t we take a break?” 

“You are so close to finishing this page.” 

Helena groaned and rolled onto her back, staring up at the flowers painted on Dinah’s ceiling so she didn’t have to look at the book anymore. She hated English and she hated reading and she hated that she was reading books meant for babies. Fucking babies could read better than she could. 

God, Dinah was wonderful. They had been working on this book for nearly an hour and Helena had barely made it past the third chapter, but Dinah had listened to her struggle through every sentence with a startling amount of patience and helped her with the words she didn’t get and gave her kisses when she made it through a paragraph. Helena was so fucking lucky. 

“This was one of my favourites when I was a kid.” Dinah said, not moving from where she was cross-legged on her comforter. She wasn’t wearing a shirt, just something she called a bralette that Helena didn’t quite understand but that gave an almost unobstructed view of her boobs, so Helena wasn’t going to ask any questions. It wasn’t particularly helpful for Helena’s concentration. “My mom used to read it to me every night before bed. We had to get a new copy because I wore out the spine, and when the movie came out, I watched it so much I could recite it from memory.” 

“There’s a movie?” Dinah hadn’t told Helena that. Why couldn’t they just watch the movie instead? Helena didn’t really like movies, either, but at least you didn’t have to read when you watched movies. “Can we watch the movie?” 

“Sure. When you’re done the book.” Dinah smiled and Helena groaned again, rolling back onto her stomach. Alright. She could do this. She was Huntress, cool, badass, rogue, vigilante. A fucking children’s book was not going to break her. Dinah combed her fingers through Helena’s hair and tapped the place they had left off. “We can make out once you finish this chapter.” 

“Next time lead with that.” Helena found the word she had gotten frustrated in the middle of and set her finger on the page, her brow furrowing as she sounded out the word. Fuck, she hated this. Twenty-four years old and she was fumbling her way through a book written for children. It wasn’t like Helena was stupid, either. Reading was just hard. She didn’t like reading in Sicilian, either, mostly because no books were translated into region-specific dialects, and reading in English was almost unbearably awful. _“They all sat down, panting for breath. And Mrs Fox said to her children, ‘I should like you to know that if it wasn’t for your father we should all be dead by now. Your father is a fan-fant,_ fantasy?” 

“Fantastic.”

“Oh. _Your father is a fantastic fox_.” What was so fantastic about him? This book didn’t make sense. Foxes couldn’t talk. Right? Cass and Renee had once spent the better part of a day explaining what from TV and books and movies was real and what was made up, which had come after Harley had convinced Helena that vampires were a very real and very dangerous threat, and foxes had not been mentioned. They couldn’t talk and they couldn’t steal things from farmers who were just minding their own business. “These foxes are mean to the farmers. They’re stealing.” 

“You’re fucking impossible.” Dinah rolled her eyes and fumbled with the clasp of her bralette, very effectively shutting Helena up. It was honestly unfair. Nothing Helena could do shut Dinah up as fast as Dinah taking her bra off shut Helena up. Every coherent thought and argument and retort Helena had fell out of her head like she was being dangled upside down and shook by an ankle. She felt like a horny teenager, but Dinah didn’t seem to mind. “C’mere and let me kiss you.” 

“You have pretty eyes.” Helena smiled, she was probably doing her love-struck puppy smile, and Dinah laughed. She was not very good at giving compliments, it wasn’t something that came easily to her, but she was trying, and Dinah knew it. “I mean it. I like how they crinkle at the edges when you smile. It makes me happy.” 

“You make me happy.” Dinah watched Helena roll over, leaning back onto her elbows and grinning widely enough to show off those perfect dimples. She was wearing loose grey shorts and her bra was lying on the comforter beside her and Helena smiled back, so broad her cheeks hurt. “Even when you diss my favourite book.” 

“I’m not dissing it. I’m just saying the foxes are thieves.” Helena tugged Dinah on top of her and looped her arms around Dinah’s neck, soft blonde hair falling around them both like a lavender-scented curtain. She liked looking at Dinah like this, in the lazy sunlight of a Sunday afternoon, when they had nothing to do but kiss and read and kiss and kiss more, when she wore no makeup and her skin practically glowed and Helena could see all the freckles on her nose. 

“Stop talking, please.” Dinah leaned down and caught Helena’s bottom lip between her own, another excellent tactic to get Helena to shut up. Every single one of her kisses felt like the first, Dinah was so good at kissing and she was so good at kissing Helena until she was a puddle of scars and too-long limbs, one thigh pressed between Helena’s and both hands braced on either side of her head. 

Helena didn’t think she’d ever felt this kind of peace in her life. Actually, she had never felt this kind of peace in her life, this warmth, this strange joy. It was weird and nice and Helena wanted to feel like this forever and ever amen. They were going to Renee’s later for dinner with her and Cass and Harley and maybe Ellen, and then they were going to drive home on Helena’s bike and sit in Dinah’s apartment in their underwear and drink wine and have excellent sex until three in the morning. Helena couldn’t imagine anything better. 

“Alright. One more chapter, baby.” Dinah broke their kiss, a thin line of spit still connecting their lips, and grinned at Helena’s whine. No fucking fair. Helena reached up and tried to kiss Dinah again, but Dinah leaned back and clicked her tongue in the way that she did that made Helena’s stomach twist. “I said we could make out once you finished your chapter. You finished your chapter, we made out. One more chapter and you can suck my tits.” 

Helena had never picked up a book so fast in her entire life. 

“How do you simplify an algebraic expression?” Cass asked, looking up from her math textbook with a frown. Helena and Cass were sitting side-by-side at Renee’s kitchen island, Cass was doing math homework and Helena was filling in a spelling workbook meant for fifth-graders and Helena was not having a good time. 

Renee stirred her pan of chicken and took a very long sip of her wine, downing nearly half the glass in one go. Ellen and Dinah and Harley were sitting in the living room, drinking white wine and talking about something, and Renee was making enchiladas. Helena felt like a child, relegated to doing homework with the high schooler and not allowed to drink. Well, she wasn’t not allowed to drink, she was driving home, but still. 

“Yo.” Cass said, louder. “Helena, you just misspelled Wednesday, so I’m assuming you don’t know what algebra is, therefore I need someone else’s help.” 

“What?” Helena frowned down at her workbook. Spelling was so stupid. “I hate English. Why don’t you have rules?” 

“We have rules. They’re just dumb rules. Renee! How do you simplify an algebraic equation!” 

“I don’t know. Math got changed since I did it last.” Renee finished her wine in another single gulp and poured herself more, there were already two empty bottles on the counter and half the third was gone. “Ellen or Harley is gonna be your best bet, kid. I’m fairly certain Dinah made other kids do her math homework and Helena can’t do subtraction.” 

“I can do subtraction.” 

“No, you can’t. Also, Saturday doesn’t have two T’s.” Cass hopped off the barstool and picked up her textbook, disappearing into the living room. Why didn’t Saturday have two T’s? God, she hated English. Renee snorted into her wine, continuing to stir her chicken as Helena erased her first spelling of Saturday and rewrote it. 

“Lena, I gotta talk to you about something.” Renee said suddenly, setting down her glass. Oh, fuck, it was serious if Renee was putting down her wine. Was she in trouble? No, she was twenty-four years old, she couldn’t get in trouble with Renee. Renee wasn’t her mom. Oh, god, was Renee her mom? She was old enough to be Helena’s mom, actually, she was older than Helena’s mom would have been. 

“It was Cass. Or Bruce. Actually, it was Cass and Bruce. Both of them did it.” 

“You’re not in trouble. I have something for you.” 

Helena balanced her pencil on top of her knuckles and looked over at Renee, furrowing her brow as Renee removed a black velvet box from her pocket and pushed it over the counter. Was Renee proposing? Weird. “Ellen figured it might be easier if I gave it to you.” 

“I don’t want to marry Ellen.” Helena didn’t touch the box, frowning at Renee. “She’s really pretty and everything, but-” 

“Lena, this isn’t a fucking proposal. I’m way too old for you and Ellen isn’t interested in goth assassins built like teenage boys.” Renee rolled her eyes and picked up her wine again, taking a large sip. Mean. Helena wasn’t built like a teenage boy. She was just lanky and flat-chested. “It’s your mom’s. They were gonna auction it off, but I figured you might want it.” 

Her mom’s. Helena didn’t have anything of her mother’s besides her face, she hadn’t been able to take anything with her to Sicily, and the single photograph of the four of them she owned had been given to her by Sal. She turned the box over in her fingers, then flicked it open neatly to reveal her mother’s engagement ring, a ring she hadn’t seen in nearly sixteen years.   
__

_Helena can’t breathe, can’t move, can’t think, can’t do anything except lie very very still and pray to God that she will wake up from this nightmare soon. Her ears are ringing and all she can smell is blood and gunpowder and smoke and she clutches Pino’s stupid little purple car like she will die if she lets it go. Her mother’s body partially covers hers, and it is her mother’s body because Helena can feel blood soaking into her dress and when they opened fire her mother shielded Helena’s body with her own and they fell together, while Pino’s tiny body was torn into with bullets and her father crumpled and her aunts and uncles and cousins were gunned down._

_“Check to see if they’re all dead.” She hears, it is the voice of her godfather, of a man who she calls Zio Stefano, a man who gives her Baci candies every time she sees him. Oh, Dear God, if you are real, please let me die or please let me get out of this alive. Helena knows what happens to people who survive things like this, she has heard stories from her mother and her father and her older cousins about daughters who are beaten and tortured and she will not be one of them._

_Footsteps. Helena shuts her eyes and prays, holding Pino’s car so tight she can feel the wheels digging into her palm. Her mother’s arm is draped over her face, protecting her even in death, and Helena does not let herself cry. She can feel blood running down her neck and her mother is still warm and she holds her breath, forcing the awful sobs back down her throat. No. You are strong, Helena Rosa, you are my little dove and you are the bravest girl I have ever known. You will get through this. Her father told her this when she had to show and tell or on the first day of school, but this is worse than standing in front of the class and introducing herself._

_More footsteps approach her, a pair of shoes stopping by her head, and Helena prays that he will kill her and he will make it quick. She does not want to suffer. She hopes Pino and her mother and her father did not suffer, that when death came for them it was fast enough that they did not feel the bullets. They have been dead less than a minute and already Helena has switched to past tense, already tucked them away into a hollow part of her heart where they will now live forever._

_He lifts her mother’s arm and Helena looks up at him, at Sal. Oh, please not Sal. Sal could not have been in on this. Sal is her father’s driver, he takes her to school and helps her with her homework and sneaks her lollipops when her mother isn’t looking. Not Sal. Anyone but Sal. She looks at Sal and Sal looks at her and he shakes his head very slightly and puts her mother’s arm back down over her face. He does it wrong and her mother’s hand lands beside her head, bloody and limp and empty._

_“All dead.” She hears Sal say, and she looks over at her mother’s hand. The hand that fed her and clothed her and braided her hair and stroked her back when she was sick, the hand that held her and smacked her in the back of the head and scrubbed dirt off her face and tied her shoes and helped her cross the street. It is painted a garish red, like the fingerpaint only Pino was allowed to play with, and blood is collecting between the diamonds and opal of her wedding ring, outlining the jewels and running over the gold band. Helena loves that ring. “The Bertinelli family ended here.”_

_Helena swallows a sob. Are they going to leave her? Are they going to clean up? Is Sal going to leave her here, among the fresh corpses of her family, soaked in blood and alone for the first time in her entire life? She listens to them leave, waits until the door slams and she is sure they are gone to let herself break. Helena doesn’t cry often, her father thinks it a weakness, but her father is face-down on the floor a few feet away, his blood seeping into the carpet she isn’t allowed to play on. Pino is sprawled between them, he looks so small among the shattered glass and bullet casings and pools of blood, and Helena vomits onto the rug. Once, twice, until her stomach is empty and she is shaking, tears running down her face and staining the neck of her dress that is already coated in her mother’s blood. She is covered in it, hot and sticky and reeking, and it is in her hair and dragging down her clothes and she vomits again, nothing but bile. Her mother is staring at her, eyes glassy and empty, and Helena’s breath comes out in harsh, gaspy sobs as she grabs for her mother’s hand._

_The Bertinelli family ended here, Sal had said. What does that make her?_

“Helena.” Renee said sharply, wrenching Helena out of her memory at lightning speed. Fuck. She had been working on not slipping into the worst parts of her brain, on these vivid memories not overwhelming her at terrible moments, but she had last seen this ring on the cooling corpse of her mother with dark blood pooling in the seams. “You alright? Need a minute?” 

“Yeah, I’m just gonna-.” Helena nearly tripped over her own feet in her hurry to get out of the room, she was not going to let herself cry in front of Renee, and locked the bathroom door behind her before pressing her hand to her mouth to muffle the strangled cry that escaped her lips. Helena hadn’t cried in nearly a year, she hated crying and she hated feeling vulnerable, but once that first tear slid out of her eye, she crumbled into pieces on Renee’s bathroom floor. 

Helena didn’t cry. Luca had hated tears, hated weakness, and he had screamed at her loudly enough the first time she had cried in front of him that she hadn’t cried again for the next fifteen years. Never. Not when Massimo had broken her nose, not when she had caught a crossbow bolt in the shoulder, not when she had dislocated her shoulder and had to shove it back into place herself. She grit her teeth and she went on with her life, because that was what you did. But, oh, god, she was sobbing on the floor of Renee’s bathroom clutching her mother’s ring like an anchor. 

Someone had cleaned the ring, scrubbed blood from between the diamonds and polished the opal and kept the gold from getting tarnished. It looked almost identical to how it had looked when Helena’s mother had worn it, when Helena had tried it on as a child, pretty and polished and nice. It was a family ring, before her father had given it to her mother, her grandfather had given it to her grandmother, her great-grandfather had given it to her great-grandmother, it had been in her family for generations. Helena had honestly assumed her mother had been buried in it, she almost never took it off. Now it was hers, because there were no Bertinellis left but her, and it would probably die with her. Helena wasn’t sure why, exactly, she was crying because of this ring, it was just a ring, but she scrubbed at her eyes with her fists like a child and took a deep breath. 

“Sunshine.” A soft tap at the door, and Helena knew Dinah’s voice anywhere. Fuck. Dinah couldn’t see her like this. Dinah didn’t deserve this, this mess of a woman crying on a bathroom floor over a fucking ring. Dinah deserved everything in the entire world. Not Helena, who was so broken inside she might never be able to love Dinah properly. “Can I come in?” 

“No.” Helena blew her nose into a handful of toilet paper. 

“Why not?” 

“I don’t want you to see me like this.” 

“Baby, open the door.” Dinah said, a little more firmly, and Helena opened the door because she’d do anything if Dinah used her stern voice. She kept her face in her hands, looking Dinah in the eyes would hurt, and ran her thumb over the thin gold band. God, she was pathetic. “Hey. Come here.” 

Dinah’s arms were warm and strong and Helena leaned into her chest, the steady pounding of her heart comforting Helena more than any words ever could. Dinah ran a hand over her hair, smoothing a few dark strands off Helena’s forehead, and kissed the top of her head. Helena didn’t deserve her. She didn’t deserve anything, and she had Dinah, who was beautiful and kind and gentle and sweet and loving and caring and funny and smart, who helped her read and kissed her and showed her where to put her hands and her mouth. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” Dinah rubbed her thumb over the constant knot at the top of Helena’s spine, her touch firm and soothing. Helena didn’t know how she managed to be so wonderful all the time and she wondered if she might ever have the words to express how thankful she was. “Or do you want kisses?” 

“Kisses.” Helena would have talked to Dinah if she knew what was wrong, but she didn’t know what was wrong, only that kisses might help. Dinah’s kisses could probably cure someone of a broken leg, honestly. She fit her mouth against Dinah’s carefully, white wine and strawberries, and pressed their foreheads together. For a while, they sat there, lips touching, unmoving, Helena breathing Dinah in because being around her made Helena feel better. It always did. 

Dinah pulled away first, cupping Helena’s face in her hands and running a thumb along her cheekbone. Helena took a deep breath, shuddery and wet, and let the edge of the diamond bite into her palm. She felt hollowed out, achy, her chest hurt and her eyes were raw and she was sure she had left tear tracks on Dinah’s shirt, but here, in Dinah’s arms, she had never felt safer. 

“I’ve got you, sunshine.” Dinah kissed each of Helena’s eyelids, softly, barely a brush of her lips, and her voice was enough to make Helena want to start crying again. “I’m not going anywhere, okay? Never. Talk to me, don’t talk to me, I’m always here. Always.” 

Helena nodded, letting Dinah kiss the tip of her nose. “Even though I can’t spell Saturday?” 

“Baby, Saturday is like the easiest day to spell. I could _maybe_ understand Wednesday. How can you shoot a bug from a mile away and not spell Saturday?” 

“I couldn’t spell Wednesday either.” 

“Yeah, that doesn’t surprise me. Cass is gonna make fun of you forever.” 

“I don’t mind. She’s a good kid.” 

Dinah sighed, smiling, and kissed directly between Helena’s eyebrows. “Harley’s going to think we’re fucking in here if we take too much longer.” 

“Well…” 

“You’d be a better dinner than whatever Renee cooked, but I think she might kill us if we miss dinner because I was fucking you on the counter.” 

Okay, well that was just no fair. Helena scowled, making Dinah laugh loudly and tuck some hair behind her ear. “Trust me, sunshine, we need a lot more room and a lot more time for me to fuck you properly.” 

“Is working me up fun for you?” Helena asked, tightening her grip on the ring in her hand. “It’s mean, honestly. Cruel and unusual punishment.” 

“Oh, baby, I’m just getting started. Come on. I want enchiladas.” 

They went back to Helena’s after dinner. Partially because Dinah always said she liked Helena’s apartment (a blatant lie, because Helena’s apartment was small and messy and she didn’t have a bathroom door, for fuck’s sakes) and partially because Helena hadn’t actually slept in her own bed in nearly a week and she didn’t have any clothes left at Dinah’s. 

“You’re so beautiful.” Dinah said softly, one hand skimming Helena’s navel as Helena fumbled with her keys. Dinah was pressed into Helena’s back, mouthing at the bare skin of her shoulder blade as she felt Helena’s abs. She had been grinding shamelessly into Helena’s ass for their entire ride home, arms tight around Helena’s waist as they drove home on Helena’s bike, and all the way up the stairs it had been an effort for Helena not to just fuck her right there on the dirty cement. “How’d I get so lucky?” 

“Says you.” Helena missed the lock when Dinah bit down on the muscle in her shoulder, her teeth scraping over pale skin. Dinah spent a lot of time with her mouth on Helena’s muscles; she had once spent an entire afternoon licking everywhere from calf to forearm and semi-regularly brought herself to orgasm by grinding on Helena’s abs. She swore, nearly dropped her keys, and finally stabbed them into the door and unlocked it as fast as humanly possible. 

“I am going to fucking ruin you.” Dinah said in that low, rough voice that could make Helena’s entire body start screaming, her lips still pressed into Helena’s shoulder as Helena shoved the door open and tugged Dinah inside. They didn’t even bother with the lights, Dinah was already dragging Helena down to the floor and crawling on top of her, knees on either side of Helena’s hips as Helena kicked the door shut with a foot.

And then Dinah’s tongue was in her mouth and those hands were pushing up her tank top and Helena almost didn’t notice when the lights flicked on and the safety clicked off a gun behind her head.


	13. 12? 13?: men are boring and suck

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> helena sees some old friends and (omg) experiences an emotion that isn't rage

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for abuse.

“Bang. Now you’re dead, _piccola morte_. Do you remember nothing I taught you?” 

Helena, still sprawled on the floor with her shirt almost all the way over her head, wondered if she was being punished for something. Did God hate her? Did he do this shit on purpose? He had to. No way Luca and Sal and Massimo had just ended up in her apartment the moment Dinah was about to fuck Helena into next week. God fucking damnit. 

“I remember.” Helena groaned, wriggling back into her shirt as gingerly as she could. Dinah sat up, eyes wide, and pulled Helena up with her. “Do you mind? We both know you aren’t going to shoot me.” 

“Put the gun away, Patri. You’re being dramatic.” Massimo, leaning against Helena’s fridge and scraping at his cuticles with a pocketknife, nodded at her. “Hey, _piccola vespa_. Who’s this?” 

The barrel of Luca’s gun was still levelled at Helena’s forehead, which she found wildly unessaccary considering this was her fucking apartment and they were the ones who had broken in, and she peered down it towards Luca. She hadn’t seen him in almost two years, hadn’t seen any of them in nearly two years, and Luca had aged. He had aged a shocking amount, actually, deep wrinkles marred his face and his hair was more grey than black, the hand curled around the grip of the gun was more gnarled than she remembered. Huh. 

“Helena.” Dinah, who had gotten to her feet and wiped her mouth on the back of her hand, though her lips were still slightly swollen from kisses, fixed her shirt. She was looking between Massimo and Luca with wide eyes, and it occurred to Helena that Dinah didn’t actually know Luca and Massimo. 

“Oh, uh, Dinah, this is Luca and Massimo. Luca, Massimo, this is Dinah.” Helena stood up too, rubbing her neck guiltily. Why was she guilty? She was an adult, pushing twenty-five, and she was allowed to have sex in her own apartment. Not her fault they had shown up unannounced in her home with a gun. 

“Hey.” Massimo jerked his chin at Dinah, which was weird, because Massimo never talked to strangers. He had changed too, less than Luca had, but he had buzzed his hair off and grown a beard and there was a new tattoo on the front of his neck. “Sorry about the gun. He’s a bit dramatic.” 

“I figured.” Dinah offered Massi a small smile, which he returned. Was Massi getting soft in his old age? He wasn’t actually old, only ten years older than her, but this was the nicest he had ever seen him act in fifteen years of knowing him. He did have a weakness for pretty girls, and Dinah was the most beautiful woman in the entire universe, so that was fair enough. 

Luca put the gun down on Helena’s side table and stuck out a hand, which Helena shook. They were not huggers, never had been, and Luca’s grip was feebler than she remembered, he didn’t squeeze hard or try to twist her wrist to force her to break away from him. “Two years and you forget all of your training, _piccola morte_. Do I need to take you home?” 

Helena’s home was standing behind her, but she was not about to correct Luca when his hand was inches from a gun, so she just rolled her eyes and slapped her palm against Massimo’s neatly. Massimo was still looking at Dinah and while Helena understood completely why he was staring, she was painfully beautiful, she still wanted to punch him a little bit. 

“Why are you in my apartment?” Helena tucked her hands into her pockets, praying to god neither Luca or Massimo had seen her tits. God, please let the ground swallow her whole if they had. “How long have you been here?” 

“Flight got in this morning. Patri wanted to surprise you, I told him you were probably busy but you know he doesn’t listen to me. And you were busy, so I was right.” 

“Did you break in?” 

“Your door wasn’t locked.” 

Oh. Fuck. Helena hadn’t been home in a week, which meant her apartment had been unlocked for a week, but she didn’t actually own anything of particular value, so it was probably fine. Luca peered at Dinah, squinting at her with that awful face he did when he was about to say something awful, and then he looked back at Helena. “You said no dates. You lie to me, _piccola morte_?” 

“I said I wasn’t dating any men, Luca. And I’m not.” Helena didn’t often consider her own death, not anymore, but Luca catching her with Dinah’s hands up her shirt had her wondering how quickly she could get her hands on the gun and stick the barrel in her mouth. “That’s not lying.” 

“Don’t talk back to me.” Luca said sharply and Helena straightened. Shoulders back, spine rigid, chin up but eyes down. She was taller than him by several inches, but Luca could make Helena feel like the smallest person in the world without even trying. He always could, he had taught her to shoot and how to fight and how to let someone scream at you for hours on end without shedding a single tear, how to take a punch without flinching and how to get your nose broken and keep going with your life. He was the most frightening man Helena had ever met, and she had met way too many frightening men. 

Dinah rested a hand on the small of Helena’s back, lightly enough that Helena didn’t shudder away from the touch, and flashed Luca her _I hate men and especially you_ smile. Just a little bit of dimple, a disarming tilt of the mouth, it normally left Helena fucking breathless but Luca just scowled. 

“ _Piccola vespa_ , you live in a dump.” Massimo said before Luca could open his mouth, and Helena was oddly thankful that he had cut Luca off. “Why isn’t there a door on your bathroom? And why don’t you own any cups?” 

“I own a cup.” Helena grumbled, leaning back into Dinah’s hand. Dinah ran her thumb over Helena’s spine, soft and soothing, a touch that let Helena know that I am here. You are safe. It’s alright. Massimo snorted, tucking his switchblade into his pocket, and pushed off the fridge to shake Dinah’s hand. 

“Hi. Massimo Vitale. Very nice to meet you, though I do wish it hadn’t involved a gun.” 

“Dinah. Same.” Dinah shook Massimo’s hand and then extended it to Luca, keeping the pleasant but hard smile on her face. “It’s great to meet you both. Helena talks a lot about you.” 

That was a lie. Helena never talked about Luca or Sal or Massimo more than necessary, but she supposed it was easier to say ‘Helena talks a lot about you’ than to say ‘Helena has never willingly spoken about you once in her life, ever’. Luca was staring at Dinah’s hand like it might give him rabies, but he took it gingerly and shook. Did he think she was going to infect him with lesbian? Being gay wasn’t contagious. 

“Weird, cause I’ve never heard anything about you.” Massimo flashed Helena a shit-eating grin, the one he used when Luca got mad at her instead of him, and Helena briefly considered giving him a scar to match the one cutting through the left side of his beard. “I can’t imagine why.” 

“Alright.” Helena said, because the last thing that she needed was for Dinah and Massimo to start ganging up on her. “Where’s Sal? Are you planning on staying here?” 

“Sal’s got business, and all three of us thought for sure you’d live in a place a little bigger than this. Seriously, _piccola vespa_ , it’s not like you can’t afford it.” 

“That’s what I’ve been saying. Though I’m sure you know she doesn’t listen.” 

“God, she never listens. Isn’t it awful?” 

“Could we not do this, please?” Helena scowled. She listened. She listened all the time. She listened to Dinah, at least, because Dinah had a beautiful voice and every single word out of her mouth was a blessing. “You guys can stay here. I’ll go to Dinah’s.” 

“Aww.” Massimo ran a hand over his head and made a face at Helena. He looked older without the irritating little ponytail he had been growing out the last time she had seen him, he had more hair than her, but now he looked like an old man. Helena made a mental note to tease him about it when she wasn’t wildly horny. “You having sl-” 

“Helena.” Luca interrupted, his face stony. “Come. I need a smoke. Leave Massimo and your friend here to talk.” 

God. She did not need to leave Massimo and Dinah alone together for so many fucking reasons, but saying no to Luca had never once worked in her favour, so she caught Dinah’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “Do you mind?” 

“Nah.” Dinah pressed a very light kiss to Helena’s cheek and smiled at Massimo. “I want to hear all your awkward teenage stories. Cass is gonna be thrilled.” 

“Please do not tell Cass my terrible teenage stories.” Helena groaned. The idea of Cass knowing about the summer she had grown six inches and hit her head on every single doorway in the house or the absolute horror of having to deal with her first period made Helena want to die a little bit, mostly because Harley would never, ever shut up about it. 

She and Luca walked down the stairs in silence, single file, the only sound boots against cement, and Helena wondered if he was going to scream at her. She hoped not, not in public at least, but at least he wasn’t going to do it in front of Dinah. She followed him outside, stood across from him in the alley between her building and its neighbour, and watched as he lit his cigarette with shaking fingers. Helena didn’t speak, because she wasn’t allowed to speak before he took his first drag, and only when he had tapped the ash off the end and leaned back against the wall did Luca start. 

“How long?” 

“How long what?” 

“And here I was, thinking I trained the stupid out of you. How long?” 

“Four months.” 

“Four months.” Luca repeated. She hadn’t heard his sharp, unpleasant Sicilian in person for so long it nearly made her flinch, she hadn’t heard Sicilian in person for long enough that it sounded foreign in her ears, and she watched him flick ash onto the pavement. “Is she good to you?” 

“Yes.” 

“She treats you with respect?”

“Yes.” 

“She’s strong?” 

“Yes.”

“And she makes you happy?” 

“Happier than I’ve ever been.” 

Luca considered that for a minute, tapping more ash onto the pavement, he was looking at her the same way he had looked at her the first time they had met; nine years old and barely able to speak, scared and alone and achingly sad. He would always see her like that, even though she was taller and stronger and close to three times as old as she had been when they had met. 

“She cares about you.” Luca said finally, still studying her face. “She looks at you like you hang the sun in the sky. It is how I used to look at Catalina.” 

Helena didn’t speak. Luca never talked about Massimo and Sal’s mother, she had died long before Helena had gone to live with them, but Massimo occasionally told her stories about a ferocious woman who had kept Luca in check all the way up until the car crash that had taken her life. Luca’s voice didn’t change, but he dropped his cigarette and ground it out under his boot. 

“I am glad you have found her, _piccola morte._ Even if you are having sex with her in public.” 

“God.” Helena cringed. “We were in my apartment and we were just kissing. I didn’t know you were there.”

“You should have. I will have to test your skills again. Tomorrow.” Luca said brusquely, straightening up and starting towards the door to her building. Helena let him go on ahead, shoving her hands into her pockets, and wondered if she could die happy now. Probably. What else could she possibly want? 

“Again.” 

Helena rolled her neck, savouring every pop of her joints, and flicked a strand of sweaty hair out of her face. She grinned at Massimo, who was panting hard and had a fresh bruise on his cheek, she could feel blood pounding in her ears and her muscles were screaming and a thin trickle of sweat was running down her spine, but she didn’t care. 

They were standing in a gym owned by one of Sal’s weirdo Sicilian mobster friends; her and Massi and Sal and Luca, plus Harley and Cass. The gym was fairly sketchy, but it had a boxing ring and some punching bags and was empty, so Helena was not going to complain too much. 

“When are they coming back?” Cass grumbled from where she was sitting on a stack of mats by the door, kicking her feet with a scowl. Helena had not wanted any of them to watch her train with Massi and Luca and Sal, but it was let them come or lie about where she was going, so here they fucking were. “I’m hungry.” 

Dinah had gone to get coffee and bagels with Renee, mostly so Cass and Harley would shut up about being hungry, and it had not worked because here they were. Whining. Harley was standing on her hands with her legs hooked over the mats, exposing way more of herself than anyone needed to see, and she stuck her tongue out at Helena. Harley had been making eyes at Helena and Massimo all morning, which was mega gross, mostly because Massimo had also checked Harley out several times. How would that even work? Harley was loud and colourful and more than a little batshit, and Massimo was quiet and grumpy and fairly normal (besides the whole Sicilian assassin thing). They weren’t that far apart in age, Harley was twenty-eight and Massimo was thirty-four, but it was still way too much of her worlds overlapping for Helena’s liking. Gross. Gross gross gross. Harley liked girls, mostly, but Helena did not like the way she was looking at Massimo in a tank top for so many reasons. 

“ _Piccola morte_.” Luca said sharply, snapping Helena out of her thoughts. He was standing in the corner of the ring, arms folded over his chest as he watched Massimo and Helena circle each other. Sal was in the opposite corner, but he was texting furiously and not watching. Sal had always been a busy man, he had spent ten months of the year in Gotham growing up and spent most of the summer doing business in Sicily, but this was a little ridiculous. “You are better than this. Pay attention.” 

Helena squared her shoulders and swung her fist at Massimo’s jaw, careful about how much weight she put behind it. She had busted up Massi’s face often enough that she knew he would be fine, he had never complained about how hard she hit him, but she still didn’t need him losing teeth. 

“Come on.” Massimo ignored the punch and grunted when the second connected with his stomach, he didn’t make a point of checking if Harley was watching but Helena knew he was, and she swallowed a shudder. Gross gross gross. “You can do better than that.” 

She could. Helena hit him again, this time directly in the mouth, and her hand wrap came away bloody. Massimo flashed his mouthguard and swung a fist at her cheek, hard enough that if it connected Helena might be spitting out more than blood. They were the same height now, exactly eye to eye, and Helena ducked the punch neatly. 

This was how it always went. Helena and Massimo sparred, Luca watched, Sal texted. No dinner until Helena drew blood. If she did him permanent damage, extra dessert and some drawing time after she was done the dishes. If Massimo hit her hard enough to cause serious damage (which did not happen often) Helena had to bandage herself up and do drills until the sun was long set. 

She had been eleven the first time Massimo had hit her properly, a punch she hadn’t managed to dodge. He had knocked out two of her baby teeth and laid her out flat, ears ringing, staring up at the ceiling of the wine cellar with stars dancing in front of her eyes. She had rolled over, spat a mouthful of blood and two cracked teeth onto the stone floor, and started crying. Helena hadn’t meant to cry, but her mouth hurt and Massimo had never landed a punch before and now she had two missing teeth. 

It was the teeth Helena remembered most of all, tiny and broken and stark white against the dark puddle of blood, glittering under the soft lights. She had lain there for hours after Luca and Massimo had left, staring at those two teeth, and when she had run out of tears she had stuffed a wad of gauze in her mouth and promised herself she would never cry like that again. Massimo had hit her twice more in her entire life and both times she had hit him back so hard she had broken bone. 

“Getting rusty.” Massimo swung low and just barely grazed her chin, and Helena clipped his jaw hard enough to make him stagger backwards. She wasn’t getting fucking rusty. She fought all the time. She’d kick his ass. She’d kick anyone’s ass. She’d kick her own ass. “Come on, _piccola vespa_. Make it count.” 

Behind Massimo, the door to the gym swung open and there was Dinah, windswept and gorgeous and toting a massive brown paper bag. She stole the air from Helena’s lungs, every time she saw Dinah Helena felt like she’d just been punched in the chest, and she took her eyes off Massimo and grinned at Dinah like a fucking dumbass as soon as she saw her. 

Mistake, because Massimo’s next punch (which she could have blocked easily) hit her in the temple so violently she felt stars explode behind her eyes and she swayed on her feet. Helena liked being tall, she really did, but a high center of gravity was terrible for someone who fought as much as she did. Shit. God fucking damnit. She hadn’t let Massimo actually land a punch for so long that she had nearly forgotten what came next, but it wasn’t even the pain she feared. She just didn’t want Dinah and Cass and Harley and Renee to see. 

Luca backhanded her across the face twice, sending her reeling, the dull thud of his rings against her cheekbone familiar and foreign at the same time. Helena took the hits as she always did, silently and without complaint, but a great many things seemed to happen at the same moment as soon as the back of Luca’s hand connected with Helena’s face. 

“Hey!” Renee called, slamming the cardboard tray of cups onto the mat and reaching for Cass. Oh, Cass. She shouldn’t be seeing this. Harley dove for Dinah immediately, because Dinah had thrown down her bagels and started screaming. God. Helena deserved it, she had fucked up and that meant she got hit, but no one else deserved to see it. That wasn’t fair to Cass or Harley or Renee or Dinah. 

“What the fuck is the matter with you!” Dinah yelled, Harley’s arms curling around her waist like a pair of chalk-white snakes and keeping her where she was, and Helena had never seen Dinah look so murderous in her life. Helena shook off the twin blows, ducked the ropes, and started for Dinah, ignoring Luca’s barked orders to stay where she was. “How fucking dare you! Are-” 

“Dinah.” Helena said softly, catching one of Dinah’s hands in both of hers. Renee had an arm around Cass, who had pressed her face into Renee’s shoulder, and Renee was looking at Helena with that specific mixture of pity and horror that made Helena want to curl up into a ball and die. “It’s okay. It’s okay. I made a mistake. It’s my fault. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for you to see.” 

“What?” Dinah frowned, pushing Harley off of her and staring at Helena. “Baby, you’re bleeding? What the fuck was that?” 

“I got distracted. It’s alright. I’m fine. Please don’t be mad.” 

“Why did he hit you?” 

“I made a mistake.” 

“That doesn’t mean he gets to hit you!” 

“This is none of your business.” Luca got out of the ring, leaving Massimo to lean awkwardly against the ropes and start muttering in Sicilian. Sal hadn’t looked up from his phone, which was unsurprising, and Luca was halfway to Helena when Harley stepped between them and crossed her arms over her chest. Harley was not very intimidating, but it was enough for Luca to not immediately shove her aside. “Helena, you aren’t done.” 

“Yeah, she’s done. You lay a single fuckin’ finger on Crossbow again and I’ll make sure you’re pissing out a tube for the rest of your miserable life.” Harley drew herself up to her full height (not very tall, but Helena got the sentiment) and cracked her knuckles. “Back the fuck up and maybe you get to keep your stupid eyes in your head.”

“Let’s go. We’re going. Cass, you want breakfast?” Renee asked, turning Cass away from them and ruffling her hair. A stupid question, Cass always wanted breakfast, but Harley spat at Luca’s feet and cast a glare in Massi and Sal’s direction before wrapping her arm around Cass’ other shoulder. 

Huh. Helena hadn’t been protected like that in a very long time, not since her mother had taken eight shots to the chest for her, and even though she’d rather die than admit she needed help, it was sort of nice. Dinah still looked murderous, but she just picked up Helena’s bag from where she’d dropped it in the corner and took Helena’s hand. 

Helena didn’t know how they managed to get home, her head hurt and her face hurt and Dinah hadn’t even let go of her hand to drive, but she found herself in Dinah’s bathroom fifteen minutes later, sitting on the lip of the bathtub in shell-shocked silence. No one stood up to Luca. Ever. Not Massi, not Sal, definitely not Helena. Helena had never even turned her back on Luca without earning a cuff around the ears. But Harley had, and Dinah had. Without hesitation. 

“I’m sorry.” Helena said quietly as Dinah knelt down in front of her and began unwrapping her left hand. “I didn’t mean to make you mad at me.” 

“Stop apologizing.” Dinah wound the wrap into a neat ball and set it down beside her, she wasn’t looking at Helena and her voice was thick and tight. Helena flexed her fingers, her knuckles would be dark purple by morning, and Dinah took her other hand. 

They were silent as Dinah finished undoing the wrap and dropped it beside the other, Helena didn’t know what to say besides an apology and Dinah’s shoulders were trembling with rage. She started to unlace Helena’s sneakers, which seemed like overkill, Helena wasn’t a baby, but she knew protesting would make Dinah angrier. 

“Do you think it’s okay for him to hit you?” Dinah said finally. She looked up at Helena and Helena realized with a start that she wasn’t angry. She was crying. Not loudly and not much, but her eyes were wet and there were tears running down her cheeks. Oh, God. Helena reached for her face, though she wasn’t sure why, and Dinah leaned back. “Helena. Do you think it’s okay for him to hit you?” 

“It was my fault. I deserved it.” 

“It wasn’t your fault. How was any of that your fault?” 

“I got distracted.” 

“Doesn’t matter. No one deserves to get hit, baby. No one. Did he do that often when you were a kid?” 

“Only when I made a mistake.”

Dinah got up and went over to her medicine cabinet, rummaging around for a moment before returning to stand in front of Helena with some rubbing alcohol and a few bandaids. It took Helena a minute to remember that Luca’s rings had split her cheek open, she had gotten used to the pain of that a long time ago, but Dinah poured a generous amount of alcohol onto a cotton ball and began to dab at the cuts gently. 

“Helena, no one should ever be treated like that.” Dinah tilted her chin up and wiped a bit more blood off Helena’s cheek, her fingers warm and steady. “You didn’t deserve it. No one deserves it. I don’t want you thinking for even a second that you deserved to be treated the way those men treated you.” 

“It made me strong.” 

“Don’t you say that shit. You would have been strong no matter what. None of that made you strong. **You** made you strong. Okay?”

“But-” 

“But nothing. How would you feel if it was Cass?” 

Helena would have hunted down and killed anyone who dared even look at Cass wrong. She would have destroyed them, slowly and painfully, and—oh. Shit. God, she hated it when Dinah made good points she couldn’t argue with. Dinah smoothed a small bandaid over one of the cuts, blinking back tears as she brushed some hair off Helena’s forehead and kissed her temple. 

“I love you, Helena Bertinelli.” Dinah said against her brow, her voice soft and warm. She was still crying, Helena could feel hot tears seeping into her hair, but Helena didn’t think they were bad tears anymore. “I love you so much. I can’t see you hurt and I can’t have you thinking you deserved any of that.” 

“You love me?” Helena shut her eyes and leaned into the embrace. She was fairly certain she had loved Dinah from that moment she had corrected Renee about the crossbow and flashed those dimples when Helena had thanked her; but she had never said it because words were hard but loving Dinah was the easiest thing she had ever felt. 

“Yeah. I do. And you don’t have to say it back, not if you don’t want to, but-” 

Helena kissed her. Softly, because her lip was split and there was a cut on the inside of her cheek from where her teeth had gouged into the soft skin, but Dinah’s lips could make her forget every bruise and scrape and scar. She loved Dinah. More than she could ever put into words. 

“I love you too.” Helena said once they came up for air, grinning her idiot smile at Dinah. “A lot. More than everything, I think.” 

“More than crossbows and leather pants?” 

“Way more than crossbows and leather pants.” 

“High praise indeed, Bertinelli.” Dinah stuck her tongue out at Helena and laughed when Helena caught it between her teeth, tugging lightly. “I wanted to show you something. Now might be a bad time, though.” 

Helena shook her head and lifted Dinah up, which she immediately regretted as soon as she slammed Dinah’s head into the curtain rod. Fuck. Dinah just smiled, looping her arms around Helena’s neck, and kissed the tip of her nose. “God, I love you. Bedroom.” 

“How’s that feel?” Dinah tugged at the harness carefully, pressing a kiss to Helena’s hipbone as she adjusted the last strap. “Too tight? Too loose?” 

“It’s good.” Helena managed, the sight of Dinah kneeling on the carpet completely naked was making it very hard for Helena to form words, and she pushed some hair off her face and looked down at the piece of silicone sticking out from between her thighs. Helena (who had admittedly never seen or had any interest in seeing an actual dick) was fairly certain they weren’t supposed to be purple. She liked purple, though, it was her favourite colour, so she wasn’t going to say anything. 

“Okay. You have to tell me if you’re uncomfortable, sunshine.” Dinah got up and stretched her arms over her head, directing Helena’s eyes to her tits, and her grin was the most beautiful thing Helena had ever seen. “Enjoying the view?” 

“Just a little.” Helena answered Dinah’s smile with her own and reached for her, to touch and take and kiss and hold. She loved Dinah and Dinah loved her. They were in love! Love! What an awful word, but Helena wanted to shout it from the goddamn rooftops. Dinah tossed one impossibly long leg over Helena’s lap, sliding her fingers into Helena’s hair, and kissed her hard.

They kissed for a very long time, Dinah tugging expertly at Helena’s hair to make her groan, all lips and teeth and tongue. Helena gripped Dinah’s hips, chests pressed together, and Dinah dug her nails into Helena’s scalp and broke their kiss. Helena took a deep breath, Dinah’s lips were wet with spit and her eyes were bright and she rolled her hips into Helena’s and smiled. 

“I love you.” Dinah pressed a sloppy kiss to the side of Helena’s jaw, letting her teeth scrape at the delicate skin, and slid her hand down to Helena’s shoulder, kneading the muscle with her thumb. “I love your smile and your laugh and the little crinkle you get between your eyebrows when you’re really focused. I love how you yawn in the mornings and I love the way you look at me all the time when you think I don’t notice.” 

“I don’t look at you all the time.” Helena protested, tilting her head so Dinah could kiss down the side of her neck. Dinah dragged her mouth down, hard enough to bruise, and bit down softly on the crook of Helena’s neck. 

Dinah thumbed at Helena’s hardened nipple and Helena hissed, her hips twitching upwards involuntarily. “Yeah, you do. It’s nice. You always look so angry, but I’ll catch you staring when I get out of the shower or when you think I’m already asleep, and you look happy. Warm. You look like you’re home.” 

“I am home.” Helena adjusted her grip, sliding her hands down to the curve of Dinah’s thighs and squeezing gently. “You’re my home. You make me happier than I thought people could be and you make me want to be a better person. I love you.” 

Dinah smiled and braced herself on her knees, lifting herself up so she was poised above the strap between them. She cupped Helena’s face in her hands, stroking her cheekbone softly, and kissed Helena at the same moment she sunk down onto the toy slowly. Dinah exhaled sharply into Helena’s mouth, shifting her hands down to use Helena’s shoulders for balance, and shut her eyes. 

“Does it hurt?” Helena asked, she really didn’t want to hurt Dinah, and Dinah shook her head as she lowered herself down until she was fully seated on Helena’s lap. Her skin was soft and warm under Helena’s hands, bodies pressed together, and Dinah just looked at her with those perfect brown eyes and gave her a gentle smile.

“No. Just been a minute.” Dinah said and Helena nodded like she understood. She couldn’t feel much, just the base nudging at her clit, but Helena could get off on the sight of Dinah alone and she watched as Dinah leaned forwards slowly and pressed their foreheads together. “God, you feel so fucking good.” 

Helena watched Dinah for a moment, watched as she took her bottom lip between her teeth and clenched her jaw and groaned. She was the most beautiful woman in the world, the kindest and the bravest and the smartest, and Helena loved her more than life itself. Dinah pressed upwards slowly, lifting herself off Helena almost fully before sliding back down and moaning. 

“I love you so much, baby.” Dinah tipped her head back to let Helena kiss the long length of her neck, falling into a steady rhythm with Helena’s hands on her ass and a tight grip on her shoulders. Helena mouthed at the pulse beating beneath Dinah’s skin, breathing in the smell of lemon and salt and lavender, and lifted her own hips to meet one of Dinah’s thrusts. “Oh, fuck.” 

Damn. She had barely meant to do that, she didn’t know her body could do that, but Dinah dug her nails into Helena’s shoulder and gasped. “Shit, I’m sorry. Am I not supposed to-” 

“Again.” Dinah breathed, her throat bobbing against Helena’s mouth, and she wrapped her arms around Helena’s shoulders and pulled her close. Helena thrust upwards, earning a groan, and buried her face in Dinah’s neck. She slid her arms around Dinah, splaying her fingers wide over Dinah’s spine and matching her thrust for thrust. “Oh, god, baby. Fuck, just like that.” 

Helena was not very good at dirty talk, it sounded strange in her mouth, so she just pressed kisses to Dinah’s collarbone and murmured into her skin. _I love you, I love you, I love you._ Dinah cupped the back of Helena’s head and rocked her hips, the base of the strap scraping against Helena’s clit at the perfect angle. 

“Come on, sunshine. I’m so close.” Dinah pulled at Helena’s hair and tipped her head back, capturing her lips in a desperate kiss. Helena kissed her back, hard, sloppy, grinding her hips up into Dinah’s and Dinah made a desperate noise in the back of her throat and came hard. Helena kissed her through it, slowing her thrusts to a stop, and sighed. 

“I love you.” Helena murmured, her mouth just barely brushing Dinah’s. “I love you so much, Dinah Lance. I love you, I’m in love with you, everything. All of it. You are my heart and my home and the light of my life.” 

Dinah nudged her nose against Helena’s and smiled, the toy still buried inside her. “I love you too, Helena Bertinelli. Can I eat you out?” 

“Do you even have to ask?” 

“I thought it would be polite, baby.” 

“You’re never polite.” 

“That’s mean. Do you want me to eat you out or not?” 

“No, I want you to eat me out.” 

“Then stop talking.” Dinah kissed her lightly, and if there was a heaven, it could never compare to this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> an extra long chapter because i haven't updated in a bit. quarantine is kicking my teeth in rn. dedicated to my pillow fort comrades. i love you both so much.


	14. xiv: graveyards. sexier than you'd expect.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> graves and lingerie and also a little bit of vomit.

“Do you want to come visit my mom?” 

“What?” Helena looked up from the book propped on her lap, words still swimming in front of her eyes as she peered over at Dinah. Dinah was sprawled on her stomach on the bed, pencil dancing over the page of her sketchbook, and she didn’t stop drawing while she spoke. Monday afternoon, lying in bed together after a lazy morning of sex and pancakes, Dinah was sketching and humming along to the music and Helena was trying to read and they were listening to soft music that Helena didn’t recognize. She wasn’t sure she had ever been happier. 

Dinah’s eyes flitted up to Helena for less than a second before returning to her sketchbook, pencil scratching at the paper in an oddly soothing way. “My mom. Will you come visit her with me?” 

Helena frowned. Wasn’t Dinah’s mom dead? Yeah, she knew this. Dinah’s mom was dead. Like her grave? Some sort of Waluigi board? That reading thing Harley was always trying to get Helena to do? No, grave. Probably. Right? “Like, the cemetery?” 

“Yeah. I want you to see her.” Dinah tapped the top of her foot with the pencil, smiling softly. She was wearing one of Helena’s shirts and no pants, kicking her feet back and forth as she drew, and Helena was staring but it didn’t really matter. She was forever staring at Dinah, memorizing her face, the curve of her shoulders, the length of her spine, the slope of her nose and the dip of her cupid’s bow. She wasn’t an artist, never had been, but she knew that with a thousand years she could never capture Dinah’s beauty properly. 

“Sure. Now?” Helena checked her black and purple watch, a Christmas gift from Cass. It had been Christmas a few weeks ago and they had celebrated at Renee’s with a ridiculous amount of presents and a massive tree. Cass and Helena had never celebrated Christmas properly, when Helena had been young it had been church and five presents each for her and Pino, their parents had been careful not to spoil them, and Cass’ foster parents had never done anything for her. To Renee and Dinah, this was unacceptable, so they had gotten an enormous tree and presents and a turkey and stockings and all the trimmings. 

Harley, who was Jewish but didn’t practice, had complained bitterly until she saw that a decent amount of the presents were for her, and they had drunk eggnog (which Helena hated) and watched something called the Grinch (which Helena liked) and Harley had dangled mistletoe over Dinah’s head until Helena had kissed her (which Helena loved). Now it was January, snow dusting the ground and a bitter cold in the air and they spent long nights curled under blankets and kissing and warming their feet on each other. It wasn’t this cold in Sicily, ever, and Helena hadn’t seen snow in years, and she didn’t like it. It was chilly. 

“No. Tomorrow.” Dinah went back to her sketch, a stray lock of hair falling over her face that she didn’t bother pushing away. Helena leaned down, hooked it over her ear gently, and kissed her forehead before she looked down at her book again. “Do you visit your family?” 

“No. You know that.” It was true. Helena had never visited the graves of her parents and Pino, not when she had first moved back to Gotham and not after. She knew where they were buried, of course, the Bertinelli family mausoleum was where everyone in her family was buried, but she had never gone. Not on their birthdays, not on the anniversary, never. She couldn’t. Seeing their headstones, names carved into marble, made it real. If she didn’t see their graves, they could exist in a strange sort of limbo, not alive but not quite dead. Just existing in a tucked-away part of her brain where she could leave them to rot. 

Dinah took her bottom lip between her teeth and didn’t say a word, smudging a line with her thumb and frowning down at the page. She was drawing a hand, crooked fingers and short nails, a thin scar across the knuckles, and her gaze kept darting between Helena’s hand on the book in her lap and her sketchbook. 

“It might help, you know.” Dinah said finally, drumming her pencil against her bottom lip. “To see them. Talk to them. It helps me to talk to my mom. Are they at Gotham Cemetery?” 

“Yeah.” 

“So’s my mom. We could go together, if you want. Tomorrow.” 

Helena watched Dinah add another line to her drawing, studying the crinkle between her brows and the thin lines around her eyes. Dinah was going to be thirty in April, five years older than Helena, and Harley kept calling her a milf. Helena didn’t know what a milf was, but it was also what Harley called Renee, so Helena assumed it meant old. Helena was turning twenty-five soon, in a couple weeks, and she was not excited. Twenty-five was, like, old. She had never liked her birthday, not when she was young and not now, she didn’t like being the center of attention, but Dinah had said something about a trip, so she wasn’t going to complain. A trip could be nice. 

“Alright.” Helena turned the page of her book and bit down on the corner of her nail, squinting down at the words. Reading had gotten easier for her, but it still didn’t come naturally, and it was an effort to make her brain process the information. She didn’t want to go to her parent’s graves, but if Dinah was there, Helena could do anything. 

“Really?” Dinah set her pencil down and stretched out, cracking her knuckles individually. She was the prettiest woman Helena had ever seen, long limbs gleaming in the sunlight, all brown skin and soft curves, warm and bright and happy. “I thought I’d have to bribe you via tits.” 

“I’m not going to say no to being bribed.” Helena grinned, watching Dinah push herself off the bed and open her nightstand. She rummaged around for a moment and came up with a half a pack of cigarettes and a lighter, tossing some hair out of her face as she straightened. “But if you’re with me, I can do it.” 

“You’re dumb.” Dinah wriggled into her pants, leaning over to press a kiss to Helena’s lips and smile against her mouth. “I love you. Back in ten.” 

Helena watched her go, listened to the door to their apartment slam shut, and tossed her book onto the other side of the bed. She practically flung herself out of bed, throwing the top drawer of her dresser open and digging straight through to the bottom. Buried beneath the neatly folded stacks of boxers and sports bras were a matching set of red lace underwear that Harley had talked Helena into buying and that Helena hadn’t actually had the guts to wear. 

Mostly she was worried Dinah would laugh at her. It was an irrational fear, Dinah never laughed at her, but what if Dinah thought she looked ridiculous? Dinah wore underwear like this, black and white and green and sometimes pink, Helena liked to take them off with her teeth, but all Helena wore were men’s underwear and sports bras that were mostly unnecessary. She tugged her shirt off, slipping the straps over her shoulders and hooking the bra as carefully as she could with unsteady fingers. She was good at undoing Dinah’s bras, but doing them up was not her strong suit. 

Helena frowned at herself in the mirror, running her hands down her sides. The red was pretty, but it made her look very, very pale and a little ridiculous. She wasn’t a very feminine person, never had been, and this made her look like a girl. Not a girl. A woman. Gross. Helena didn’t have much in the way of curves, Renee wasn’t wrong when describing her as being built like a teenage boy, but the cut of the underwear was enough to give her the illusion of a waist and the tiniest bit of cleavage. Not a lot, but she actually looked like a normal twenty-something woman. Weird. 

She turned, twisting around to see how her butt looked in the underwear. Good. Good enough, at least. There was a yellowing bruise on her ribs and another one on her hip, the first put there by a fist and the second by Dinah’s teeth, the scars zig-zagging over her shoulders and back partially hidden by the bra. Hm. She looked almost normal. She didn’t look like the models Harley had pointed out, she wasn’t as frighteningly thin with enormous tits, but she looked sort of...nice? Nice enough? Fine?

Helena picked up her book again and flopped back down on the bed, leaning back on her elbows with her book held in front of her face, and waited. She was a little cold, cold enough that goosebumps had started to prickle across her bare stomach, but the idea of Dinah’s reaction to seeing her like this provided more than enough heat. 

The door slammed shut, loud enough that Helena flinched, and she forced herself into the most natural position she could manage, which was to say not very natural at all, and stared at her book. Footsteps, soft and slow, crossed their apartment and then she heard them stop dead in the bedroom doorway. 

“Baby?” Dinah’s voice was teasing and even though Helena couldn’t see her, she knew that Dinah had her arms crossed over her chest and half a smile on her lips. “Whatcha doin?” 

“Reading.” Helena didn’t look up from her book, which she had realized belatedly was upside-down, and listened to the bed creak slightly under Dinah’s weight. 

“Upside-down?”

“Yup.” 

“Hm. Wanna fuck me instead?” 

“Yup.” Dinah laughed as Helena flung her book across the room and kissed her, arms sliding securely around Helena’s neck. They had kissed thousands of times, millions of times, but every single time their lips touched Helena felt like it was her very first kiss ever. Every kiss sent a bolt of lightning down Helena’s spine, every brush of Dinah’s mouth against her own sweeter than anything she’d ever tasted, and Helena pressed a sloppy kiss to the side of Dinah’s jaw. 

“Fuck, you look so pretty in this.” Dinah said, tracing the edge of the lace bra with the side of her nail. Her eyes were wide and dark and hungry, roaming over every pale inch of Helena’s skin left on display. “Good enough to eat. But-” 

Oh, god. Helena removed her mouth from where it was currently sucking a bruise into the soft skin between Dinah’s jaw and neck and shifted slightly. Did Dinah not like it? God, she knew it looked stupid. She shouldn’t have even bothered. Dinah was pretty and lovely and looked good in this type of underwear and Helena was hard and didn’t shave her legs and looked terrible like this. 

“Sunshine, you know I think you’re stunning no matter what you wear, right?” Dinah tucked a lock of Helena’s hair behind her ear, those hungry eyes impossible soft as they searched Helena’s face. “I don’t want you wearing things you’re uncomfortable in if you think I’ll want you more in them. I’d want you in a fucking paper bag. I think you’re just as beautiful in your goddamn Walmart boxers as you are in lingerie, alright? I promise.” 

Helena kissed her in answer, mostly because she didn’t know what to say, and let Dinah nudge her back against the headboard. She nudged Helena’s legs open with one knee, her smile more radiant than the sun, and Helena knew that for whatever bad choices she had made in her life, Dinah was her very best one. 

Gotham Cemetery was enormous. It sprawled over nearly an acre of land, rows upon rows of headstones jutting up from the snow-dusted earth like plants breaking through soil with mausoleums and the occasional tower of cremated remains dotted across the frosted grass. 

Helena hated it. Even holding Dinah’s hand, knowing Dinah was there beside her, she was trembling for reasons that had nothing to do with the cold. Both of them wore black, Helena in dark jeans and a sweater beneath her jacket while Dinah was wrapped in a knee-length coat with black tights underneath, and it was fucking freezing. 

Neither of them spoke as Dinah led the way through the maze of white and grey tombstones, the crunching of frozen dirt beneath their feet almost unbearably loud, and when they reached an unremarkable slab of grey marble Dinah stopped moving and dropped to her knees. Helena made to take a step away, give Dinah some privacy, but a soft squeeze from Dinah’s hand had her rooted in place. 

“Hey, mom.” She said quietly, voice echoing across the field of icy stone and hard-packed earth, gloved fingers tracing the name carved onto the flat stone. “Hope you’re doing okay up there. Not picking fights with the big man or anything. Don’t ruin it for me before I get up there, okay? I don’t need your shadow hanging over me twice. That’s just not fair. 

I’m in love. Real love. The kind you and Daddy had. I spent so long watching you two slow-dance in the kitchen and wondering if I’d ever find someone who loved me the way you and Daddy loved each other, and I found her, mommy. I think you’d like her. Probably more than you like me. I wish you were here to fuss over her lanky ass and bug us about grandkids and yammer on about how polite she is compared to me. She’s the best woman I’ve ever known, mommy, and I know you’d love her so much. She makes me so happy. Happier than I’ve ever been. Actually, you might know her parents. If you find a couple of tall Italian folks, you tell them that in a different world you woulda been in-laws, alright? 

I miss you, mommy. Every second of every day. I love you and I miss you and I wish you were here with me, being a nag and burning all our food. I wish you could meet Harley and Cass. I wish you could meet Helena most of all. You’d really like her and you’d probably irritate me by always asking if I’m treating her well and you’d make us come over for Sunday dinner every week and complain that she’s too skinny. I miss you all the time, and I can’t wait to see you again.” 

Dinah stood up, wiping at her eyes with the back of her wrist, and squeezed Helena’s hand tightly. Helena blinked back a tear as best she could and let Dinah rest her head on the side of her shoulder, the smell of lavender washing over her like a balm. Fingers twined, they stood in silence for a while, and then Helena took a deep breath and started to speak. 

“Hi, Miss Drake. It’s nice to meet you.” Helena said, running her thumb over Dinah’s knuckles gently. “I’m Helena. I just wanted to tell you that your daughter is pretty cool. She’s smart and funny and she’s the kindest woman in the world. I love her more than I love anything else and I’ve never known anyone like her. I think it would have been very nice to know you and more than anything, I’m sorry I never got to.” 

“She would have liked you.” Dinah mused, her cheek warm against Helena’s shoulder. Helena wasn’t sure if Laurel Drake would have liked her, but from the almost reverential way Dinah always talked about her mother, it was clear that they had been very close. Helena hoped Dinah’s mom would have liked her. She would have liked to know Dinah’s mother, to have Sunday dinners and get bugged about grandchildren and have her lanky ass fussed over. “She liked helping people. She was a good woman.” 

“She sounds like a wonderful woman.” Helena pressed her lips to the top of Dinah’s hair, their fingers still laced tightly together. She felt uneasy and on edge and there were goosebumps prickling along the back of her neck that were unrelated to the chill in the air. She almost didn’t want to leave Dinah’s mother’s grave, because that meant next up was her parents’ grave.

They stood in silence for a while, Helena’s chin resting on Dinah's head as snow drifted down in wet clumps, dusting the headstones around them and melting against their jackets and sending icy streams of water running down Helena’s scalp. Helena had never liked winter, she didn’t like the cold and she didn’t like snow and she didn’t like wearing heavy coats and boots, but she liked being with Dinah and she liked the way Dinah leaned into her for warmth and she liked how Dinah looked in her coat, a scarf wrapped neatly around her neck and her hair pulled back in a loose bun. 

“Come on.” Dinah said finally, tilting her head up to press a quick kiss to Helena’s mouth. “One more stop.” 

The Bertinelli Mausoleum was not pleasant to look at. Two statues, one of Santo Pietro and one of Padre Pio, loomed on either side of the door, and the head of a snarling lion glared down at them as Helena and Dinah stood on the bottom step. Helena had never seen it, it was bad luck in Italian culture to visit the dead, but the bronze letters spelling out her family name weren’t hard to spot. 

“Spooky.” Dinah remarked, holding Helena’s hand tightly in her own. Helena’s spine was perfectly straight, she could feel every single snowflake as it hit her shoulders and head, and she was shaking so badly her teeth kept clacking against each other. She barely registered Dinah’s words, because her parents were in there, her brother was in there, packed into caskets and shoved into cubbies, forever frozen, trapped-

Dinah squeezed her hand, drawing Helena out of her thoughts, and looked up at her. She didn’t smile, but her gaze was warm and gentle and Helena could have drowned in her eyes, and she nudged her shoulder against Helena’s softly. “We don’t have to go in if you don’t want to.” 

“I want to.” Helena went up another step. She could feel a muscle twitching in her jaw and her fingers were freezing and her ears were hot and the back of her eyes hurt in that specific way they did when she was about to cry. Dinah followed her, keeping their fingers laced together, and pulled the heavy metal door open. 

The inside of the mausoleum was just as morbid as the outside. Grey stone floors, grey stone walls, the only light came from thin windows running along the sides and the entire place smelled stale. Musty. It was fucking creepy and Helena had half a mind to turn around and run away as fast as she possibly could. Dinah squeezed her hand softly, keeping her grounded, keeping her safe, and Helena took a deep breath. 

“You’re alright, love.” Dinah slid her arm around Helena’s waist, her voice warm and steady. “I’m here. I’m right here.” 

Helena took another deep breath and fixed her gaze on the first headstone, on the grave of her father. _Franco Guido Bertinelli, June 19th 1957-August 30th 2004. May his memory be eternal_. Nothing about loved or being loved, because her father was not a well-loved man. He was a feared man, a begrudgingly respected man, but there were three people in this world who loved him and two of them were preserved in coffins beside him. She touched her fingers to her lips and pressed them to the cool grey stone, hand shaking as she looked over at the next headstones. 

_Maria Carmela Panessa Bertinelli. Giuseppe Lorenzo Bertinelli_. Helena’s eyes filled with tears, her vision blurring at the edges, and she stared at Pino’s headstone without reading the inscription. There were four stones, four spots, but just three bodies. Dinah hadn’t said a word, her fingers tracing an absent pattern into Helena’s hip, but Helena heard that very slight change in her breathing that meant she was either surprised or confused or both. 

Helena followed her gaze, to the fourth stone, and blinked. The final name was hers. _Helena Rosa Bertinelli, February 14th 1995-_. No date of death, no engraving, but her name. It hadn’t occurred to Helena that she’d get a place here, that her name might be etched into one of the headstones, and she wasn’t sure why it hadn’t occurred to her, because she spent a lot of time contemplating her own morality and this seemed like a logical conclusion to draw, but apparently not. 

“Do you want me to go?” Dinah asked, lifting the hand not on Helena’s hip to her face and smoothing a thumb over her cheekbone. Her touch was firm and steadying and Helena pressed a kiss to the side of her gloved hand, leaning into her palm. “It’s alright if you do. I don’t mind.” 

“No. Stay. Please.” Helena kissed her hand again and turned towards the headstones, taking a steadying breath before she opened her mouth. “Hi, Mamma. Hi, Babbo. I’m sorry I didn’t come to see you earlier. I’m sorry I couldn’t save you. I’m sorry that you’re dead and I’m sorry that I didn’t make you proud. I’m sorry that I turned out this way and I’m sorry that I’m a lesbian and I’m sorry that I didn’t get to live the life you wanted for me. 

I miss you both so much, but I’m glad you didn’t raise me. I’m glad I’m not involved with the mafia. I’m glad I don’t have to be part of the family business and I’m glad that I didn’t have to marry a man and have children and raise them the way you wanted me to. I’m glad I got to choose what I did with my life and above everything I’m glad you didn’t get a chance to ruin me the way I know you would have. 

I love you. You weren’t good people and you weren’t good parents, but you tried. You did what you thought was best, and I can’t fault you for that. I miss you every day, but I think...I think I’m glad I got to grow up as Huntress and not Helena. I think I’m a better person for not being raised by you. I’m happy now. I have people that I love and people that love me and I’m so much happier than I think I would have been if I grew up with you.” 

Helena took a shuddering breath, her throat hot and tight, and Dinah touched the side of her neck with a delicate hand. She wasn’t crying, not yet, but there were tears stinging her eyes and there was a knot in her chest the size of an apple. Dinah ran a thumb over her jaw, the cool leather of her gloves soothing Helena’s flushed skin, and Helena breathed in again before turning to Pino. 

“Hey, _patato_.” Helena pressed her palm to the headstone, spreading her fingers over cold white marble and tracing his name. “Been a while, huh? I know I haven’t come to visit before, but seeing you like this makes it real, and I didn’t want it to be real. When I think about you, I want to think about you, about you pushing cars across the bedroom and making me build LEGO sets with you and making up games for us to play. I can’t think about you in here, by yourself, with no one to bother constantly and whine to. You were my best friend, Pino, no matter what I told you, no matter how much I said that brothers and sisters couldn’t be best friends. I think we’d still probably be best friends now. I wish I could have seen you grow up. I wish we could have been best friends and I could have given you advice and made fun of you and we could have talked about girls. I wish I could have been a good big sister. I wish I could have stepped in front of you when they started shooting and I wish that Mamma had protected you instead of me. I love you, Pino. Forever and ever.” 

Helena was going to be sick. She pressed a hand to her mouth, bile rising in her throat, and shook her head at Dinah as she fled the mausoleum. She didn’t want Dinah to see her like this, and she made it around the side of the building before her breakfast came back up. Helena coughed until nothing came back up, her stomach lurching unpleasantly as she spat onto the frozen ground and straightened up. 

Fuck. She was supposed to have no emotions, god damnit. She was supposed to be cool and collected and unfeeling and badass. She was not supposed to puke outside her family’s final resting place while Dinah stood inside, she was not supposed to desecrate a cemetery with half-digested cereal and a granola bar. Helena scrubbed at her eyes, wiping away the tears staining her cheeks, and took a deep breath. 

She was alright. She was alright. She could go back in there and see Dinah and say her last goodbye and then they could be done. She was so close to being done. Helena ran her fingers through her hair and was halfway down the stairs to the main antechamber (was that what they were called? Helena wasn’t sure.) when Dinah’s voice stopped her dead. 

“-and she’s the best person I know. She’s smart and she’s strong and she’s loyal and everything she does makes me love her more. You would have been lucky to be her parents. You should be proud of her. She avenged you and she finished her hit list and she grew into the best woman I’ve ever met in my life. You should be so fucking proud of her. I’m going to marry her one day and we’re going to have goth Italian babies and it is a goddamn shame that you didn’t get to see the woman she has become. Maybe she isn’t who you wanted her to be. Who the fuck cares? She is so much better than either of you could have imagined. I care for her so much and I am so lucky to get to be the woman who loves her.” 

Helena sneezed. It was dusty in the mausoleum, the smell of dirt and something sickly sweet and cobwebs making her nose itch, and Dinah turned to face her. She offered a smile made of sunshine, flashing those perfect dimples, and Helena took two steps down and kissed her. Maybe she was crying, maybe Dinah was crying, Helena didn’t know and she didn’t really are. They kissed for a long time, not deep and not hard, but tenderly. Like they were the only two people in the world. (Appropriate in front of her mother’s grave when she had just thrown up? No. Sweet and gentle? Yes.) 

“I love you.” Dinah said when they came up for air, smiling with velvet-soft eyes. “You’re so precious to me.” 

Helena pressed her forehead to Dinah’s, breathing her in, hoping that the touch would convey what words never could, and they stayed like that until Helena pulled away and sneezed into the crook of her elbow. Dinah laughed, the most beautiful sound in the world, and she pulled Helena in for another quick kiss. “I love you. Take a minute, okay? Say goodbye.” 

Dinah didn’t shut the door, letting cold air into the antechamber and stirring up the thin film of dust that covered everything in the room, and Helena tucked her hands into her pockets. She knew, somewhere in her bones, that this would be the first and last time she ever visited them, that she would never be back, and she kissed her fingertips and pressed them to each stone in turn. 

“I love you. I miss you. I promise that I will never, ever forget you.” Helena said, a single tear rolling down her cheek like she was in a cheesy movie. “Bye, Mamma. Bye, Babbo. Bye, Pino. Sleep well.” 

Helena let out a ragged breath, something painful and aching that had been knotting in her chest for a very long time beginning to unravel, and turned on her heel to follow the only family she’d ever need again.


	15. xv: damn bro! they be in love and shit!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this is it folks. the end.

Helena woke up sharply, as she always did. She had never been one to drift awake, not as a child and especially not as an adult, her eyes snapped open and then she was awake for the day. Dinah teased her for it, normally while she was lying in bed watching Helena get dressed to go on a run, but Dinah was currently asleep with her head on Helena’s chest and her hair fanning out over the pillow, so she was safe for now. 

Rain streaked the massive windows and the clouds hung low in the sky and it was Valentine’s Day. It was also Helena’s twenty-fifth birthday. Huh. Dinah sighed, nuzzling deeper into Helena’s chest, and Helena ran a hand over her hair and stared up at the ceiling. 

Twenty-five. Her mother had been married at twenty-five, pregnant with Helena, a mafia wife and a good one at that. Helena at twenty-five was unmarried, definitely not pregnant, and absolutely not a mafia wife. At twenty-five, her parents would have either picked a husband for her or forced her to pick one herself, she would have probably still lived in her childhood bedroom and had dinner with her parents and Pino every single night. 

She was twenty-five and waking up in bed with her girlfriend, the love of her life, her very best friend. She had no want or need for a husband, she lived in a nice apartment, and she ate dinner with whoever she wanted to eat dinner with. She was happy. She was so, so happy. Happier than she had ever thought she could be. 

Helena pressed a kiss to the top of Dinah’s head, smoothing a lock of hair between her fingers, and shut her eyes. She had never felt this kind of peace in her life. They had spent the last two days wandering around New York City, somewhere neither of them had ever been before, shopping and visiting museums and ignoring Harley’s persistent texts about whether or not Dinah was pregnant yet. Cass had texted twice, once asking to borrow one of Helena’s shirts and once relaying a message from Harley that should not have had to pass through a fourteen year old’s phone. Renee was a boomer, so she hadn’t texted at all, which was good, because she was a fifty-whatever woman and could function without them in a way that Harley apparently couldn’t. She sighed, the familiar fog of sleep creeping over her brain, and let her breath even out.

A finger pressing into her shoulder startled her out of the nap she had just sunk into and Helena frowned down at Dinah, the owner of the finger in question. Dinah was poking at the mouth-shaped bruise on the top of Helena’s shoulder, head still resting on Helena’s chest, and she traced it with the side of her nail. “Does it hurt?” 

“It does when you poke it.” Helena caught her wrist and brought Dinah’s fingers up to her mouth, pressing a kiss to the palm of her hand. “Morning. Happy Valentine’s.” 

“Happy birthday, sunshine.” Dinah kissed Helena’s collarbone and rolled over, propping herself up on her elbows with a grin. “How’s it feel being an old lady?” 

“Gross.” Helena groaned, sinking back into the pillows and covering her face with her hands. She wasn’t old. Right? Twenty-five wasn’t old. It wasn’t. “Please don’t remind me. Bad enough I found a grey hair yesterday.” 

“A grey hair? Wow. I wonder if Renee knows any good nursing homes we can-” Helena cut her off by flipping them over, pinning Dinah against the bed and leaning down to kiss her. It was a good kiss, Helena could feel Dinah’s smile as she let Helena kiss her deeper, and they only broke apart when Dinah wriggled out from beneath Helena’s body. 

“You’re so pretty.” Helena sat back on her heels and offered Dinah her love-struck grin. Helena told Dinah she was pretty every single day of her life and Dinah rolled her eyes every single day of her life, but it was true. Dinah was the most beautiful woman who had ever existed and Helena needed her to know. “I could live a thousand lives and never deserve you.” 

“Don’t say that.” Dinah reached for Helena’s face and tugged gently on a loose strand of hair, pulling her close to nudge her nose against Helena’s. She kissed both sides of her mouth, then the tip of her nose, and raked her fingers through Helena’s hair. “You deserve everything good in this world, Helena. I love you.” 

“I love you so much.” Helena smiled again, the dopey expression Harley made fun of her for, and Dinah pulled her back down for another searing kiss. They had been up most of the night, the reason for the long scratches running down Helena’s back and the extensive collection of bruises on Dinah’s hips and thighs and tits, but Helena could have spent every minute of every hour of every day for the rest of her life in bed with Dinah and it still wouldn’t have been enough. 

Dinah slid one hand between Helena’s legs as she kissed the side of her jaw, dragging her teeth along the sensitive skin, and lowered her mouth to Helena’s pulse as she pressed two fingers into her. Helena was wet enough that Dinah’s fingers slipped in easily and Helena’s breath caught in her throat and she shut her eyes when Dinah curled her fingers. 

“Look at me.” Dinah said softly, tucking more hair behind Helena’s ear with her free hand. She had the prettiest eyes in the world, eyes Helena could drown in, and Helena forced her eyes open to look at her. “I’m so lucky to have you in my life, sunshine. You make me so happy I can’t believe it sometimes.” 

Helena inhaled sharply when Dinah’s thumb found her clit, her hands finding purchase on Dinah’s thighs, and she bit her lip to suppress the embarrassing squeak that threatened to escape her mouth. They were silent for a while, the only sounds the fairly obscene noises produced by Dinah’s fingers and the occasional shuddering moan from Helena, and when she came it was with a high-pitched whimper. 

“You saved me.” Helena said finally, watching Dinah lick her fingers clean, her chest rising and falling rapidly and her body aching in the best possible way. “I was lost. I had no reason to live, nothing to live for, and you showed me the way. You grabbed my hand and you led me out of the dark. You’re my light, Dinah Lance. You’re my world. Thank you. I don’t know where I’d be without you.” 

Dinah watched Helena carefully as she leaned over, fumbling around in the hotel nightstand for the small black velvet box she had been too anxious to hide properly. She took a very deep breath, turning the box over in her fingers, and took out the ring. She had gotten it cleaned and resized, and Helena knew that Dinah would say yes but she still felt sick with nerves. 

“Shut up.” Dinah said as soon as she saw the glittering opal and diamonds, her voice sharp and stunned. Helena blinked. That wasn’t the answer she had been expecting. “Are you kidding me? No. Don’t move.” 

Helena didn’t move. Dinah kicked the sheets off her legs and nearly fell off the bed, dug through her suitcase, and crawled back onto the mattress with a little red box in her hand. Helena’s heart leapt up, up, up and her eyes darted between Dinah and the box. Oh. Oh. 

“Happy birthday.” Dinah flipped the box open and offered Helena a grin so wide it could have split her face in two. A silver band sat in the box, thin and simple, and Helena pressed her hand to her mouth so she didn’t burst into tears. “You mean everything to me. Everything. I love you so much. I’ve loved you since you came down that slide and I’m never going to stop loving you for as long as I live.” 

Helena took Dinah’s face in her hands and kissed her, hard, something painful and warm and perfect coiling in her chest. She didn’t know much, but she knew how to love, and that was all because of Dinah. 

“Is that a yes?” Dinah asked once they came up for air, a bright pink flush high on her cheeks, and Helena nodded so hard she nearly rattled her brain. She let Dinah slide the ring onto her finger, marvelling at the sight, and kissed her again. “Thank God. Here.” 

Dinah gave Helena her hand and Helena nearly burst into tears at the sight of her mother’s wedding ring on Dinah’s finger. It was the most perfect thing she’d ever seen, just like Dinah, and just like that, Helena had something to live for again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and we're done. thank you for reading. i love everyone who's read this story so much.


End file.
